All That Glitters
by HeartsandEyesDelight
Summary: Grissom receives a phone call from an old colleague and he and Sara end up flying to Minneapolis to assist on a possible serial connection between Vegas and the Twin Cities. GSR. Angst  of course , and, as always, a guaranteed happy ending.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: I don't own CSI.

A/N: To my Oh-so-loyal readers... I know, I know. I take forever to update Attrition, and I'm starting a new one? However, I am under the potentially incorrect belief that having something a little lighter to work on in addition to Attrition will make me feel a little less... blah, every time I work on it. In the past, multiple stories have worked for me, so I'm hoping, and I'm hoping that you'll follow me on this adventure as well. :)

That being said, reviews are appreciated. I'm a little apprehensive about this story and how it will unfold, so please, give me feedback. 3

Finally, thanks once again to Pati, who helped me make this understandable to people who might not be familiar with the potential extremes of the North. If this chapter makes any sense, or is any good, it's because of her help.

Enjoy!

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Prologue:

"We're going to be just fine." He said, but it was in the way that people speak when they're afraid those around them will panic. And maybe that isn't so far from the truth, Sara thought, watching her boss and mentor, one-time friend and love-for-all-time, as he moved around the tiny building.

It had been foolish to come here in the first place. Foolish not to wait when they'd both known the forecast. Foolish to keep coming, even as temperatures dropped and visibility lessened. Foolish to try to follow up on this slimmest of leads. …Foolish to come here with him at all, to Minnesota. She could so easily have briefed him before he got on the plane. So easily have offered her insight via email and telephone. Really, had she ever failed to answer his calls, save for a single page, years previous, when she'd been out of town and out of the service area, pretending to like wine?

But then Grissom would have been here alone, and in general, emergencies were better when shared. Sure, you had to share resources, but you also had help… extra insight… someone to talk to. …Something that might prove invaluable here shortly.

She glanced around the cabin that had clearly been abandoned for years—a decade, maybe more. There was nothing to process here, she thought bitterly, but they were lucky to have made it here at all… to have the meager shelter it offered. She gnawed on her bottom lip. She wasn't prepared for this, and that bothered her perhaps more than the situation itself. She knew what to do in an earthquake, and a flash flood, and how to survive in the desert, both in the heat of the day and when it turned frigid during winter nights. But she didn't have any winter survival knowledge for the north. She didn't know how to survive a blizzard. Yeah, she'd lived in Boston, but she had been young… she hadn't yet seen the importance of being prepared and informed on every possible danger that might befall her. …She hadn't yet seen the varied horrors life had to offer; she'd experienced a few very personal horrors, but she didn't yet know that people who were good and kind and sane could still lose everything exactly the way she had, for no real reason at all.

Grissom sighed in frustration at his cell phone and then caught her still-worried eyes and modified his voice before speaking. "…Do you have cell service?"

She immediately retrieved her phone from her pocket, checking the signal—it was weak, but there. She passed him the device in silence, and watched as he tried to hide how excited he was by the wavering, blinking line. Grissom showing excitement over this, as opposed to some science experiment or body covered in bugs… it meant that they were in pretty big trouble if he couldn't get through to anyone. She crossed her fingers and turned away from him while he made the call, pretending not to listen so that he could concentrate and pretending not to panic so he would stop tiptoeing around her.

Surely he could get in contact with the Hennepin County lab, and they could send someone from the city—someone in a large truck, with a plow and four-wheel drive and chains on the tires? Someone who would look at the swirling white that blocked out everything and feel no fear. People in California regarded earthquakes as matters of course, to some extent, didn't they? She had, when she lived there. …So people in Minnesota must be able to handle a measly little blizzard, no problem, right?

Her hands were shaking, but they were already in the pockets of a coat that was absolutely not warm enough for the climate, so she wasn't too worried about Grissom seeing them. She clenched them anyway, thinking that this would certainly calm her, a little.

Grissom was arguing with someone, but it sounded… confused. Like the connection was breaking up and he was having trouble really understanding what the person on the other end was saying, let alone getting his message across. Sara blocked it out, thinking that listening to that escalating conversation could do nothing to help her efforts to remain calm. She let her breath out in a rush and then scowled when it came in a white puff, bright and visible, even in the darkness. It was so cold, and it was only going to get colder. She took another glance around, thinking that in her anger she might have been hasty in dismissing this place as a potential scene… at least until she had seen all the rooms. And then she decided she needed to do something; she needed to be useful and feel like she was not just sitting here, waiting to freeze to death.

The cabin had no electricity, a result of the neglect of the place rather than some crazy attempt at recapturing a simpler, more rustic time. There were old, old lamps plugged into the wall, and even a television, though it had no cable boxes, merely a VCR. If she had to guess, this place had never had cable of any kind. It was small—the front room consisted of a living room and a kitchen, with bar stools pulled up to a counter to make up for the lack of a dining area. Her feet took her towards the hallway as she considered that she might as well check the rooms to be certain there was nothing to find. There she discovered far more doorways than she'd expected.

Directly across from the living room was a bathroom, complete with bathtub, and foolishly she thought of a hot shower before realizing that even if the water hadn't been turned off, there would be no electricity to work a water heater of any kind. She flicked on the small Maglite she had tucked in her pocket and flashed it around the room—there were no signs of recent life, and none of death either.

She moved to the next doorway and found a small utility room—said water heater in a corner, with a washer and dryer crammed in beside it, and some cleaning supplies on the tiny shelves. It smelled musty and she wrinkled up her nose as she repeated the procedure, confirming with a glance that this trip had been entirely foolhardy before firmly closing the door behind her again.

At the far end of the hall were two doorways—the first, on the same side of the hall as the bathroom and utility room, housed a bunk bed covered in tattered, threadbare, race car bedspreads, and a toy box in the corner. The second, behind the kitchen she thought, was the adult bedroom—it had a full-sized bed and another old television. Neither room held anything they'd been looking for, and this would be the one, other than perhaps the bathroom, where she could expect… something.

What did catch her eye was the fireplace in the corner. Grissom had told her this lake was pretty devoid of fish and would therefore not have housed ice fishers. He had told her that any cabins on this lake—all abandoned, now—would have been strictly summer retreats. She frowned at the out-of-place detail, taking in the elaborate stonework façade and the carved mantle above it. It was the only thing she'd been able to see, in the dark, that implied that the cabin had ever been more than a rundown shack on a shrinking lake in the middle of nowhere. It hinted at elegance, and it made her sad.

She shivered, only partially from the cold, and closed the door on the room, heading back out to find Grissom off the phone and looking through cupboards in the kitchen with his flashlight. She cleared her throat, and he looked at her a little sheepishly.

"They, uh… they're gonna try to get someone out here as soon as the weather clears up a bit. It's just that we're, uh… pretty far out and these roads are awful in winter. They don't get salted and in a blizzard, there's no way to see black ice or to…" He seemed to take in her confused face and offered a smile. "Well, they're trying, but it might be a little while, so we have to make the best of this, for the time being." There was something in the way he couldn't exactly meet her gaze that gnawed at her, making her feel sick to her stomach.

He was being falsely optimistic, which could only mean one thing—they were in a shit load of trouble.


	2. Chapter One

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: :) Thanks for all the feedback. Hope you guys like where this is going! And, you know, hopefully I'll get the next chapter of Attrition up soon.

Once again, thanks to Pati for the feedback. Enjoy!

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Chapter One:

Ecklie had been calling him all night.

He was ignoring it in part because he was busy—crime scenes out in the desert were extremely time sensitive, after all—and in part because it amused him to make Ecklie stay up all night trying to reach him. With the sheer number of doubles Grissom himself had pulled, he felt that expecting reciprocation was not remotely unfair or unkind. After all, it was his _job_ as Assistant Lab Director, wasn't it?

His phone rang again, this time the chirp indicating the call came from a member of his team. He answered it without thinking. "Grissom."

"Gil. So nice of you to answer."

He blinked in surprise and eyed the offending device that had deceived him—the display told him that Conrad was using Catherine's phone. He made a mental note to deny her the days off over Christmas that she'd requested back in July.

"Ecklie. What can I do for you?" He had thought, for the flicker of a moment, of offering some excuse… but Conrad wouldn't believe him anyway, and offering one at all implied that he had something to explain—something to feel guilty for.

"Your _colleagues_ from the Hennepin County Crime Lab have been harassing the lab since about five minutes after you left for your scene—something about a serial case. It sounds pretty important, don't you think?"

Grissom was far too busy wondering at this information to respond to the snide tone of his adversary. He hummed slightly, thinking, and then nodded. "Well, I'll be done here in about twenty minutes. Tell... it's Olson calling, I assume?" He asked, realizing belatedly that with the sheer number of Olsons to be found in Minnesota, that information might not really answer his question. But Ecklie had made a noise of assent, so he nodded anyway. "Tell him I'll give him a call as soon as I'm back in the lab. Half an hour, forty-five minutes, tops."

"I'm not your receptionist, Gil. I don't pass on your messages."

His lips quirked. "Well, then pass on my message to Judy, and she'll tell him."And with a self-satisfied air, he snapped his phone closed. He glanced around the scene, thinking that twenty minutes had been too generous… he'd likely be done in ten. But there was no reason he couldn't pick up some decent coffee for his CSIs on the way back, just to aggravate his supervisor. …Except Catherine. She could drink the lab sludge.

He slid his phone into his pocket and put on a new pair of gloves to finish his final task, humming Jingle Bells brightly.

"Gil Grissom, you are impossible to reach."

The entomologist laughed, fiddling with the corner of the blotter on his desk. "And you are impatient as ever, Craig. How's it feel, stepping up into old Gerard's office?" In truth, Grissom had lost his respect for the man who had supervised the pair of them as CSI Level Ones, but he was not entirely brain dead when it came to politics and general niceties one was expected to observe; he was aware that, having not spoken to the man since before his promotion, it was polite to offer some sort of mention of the man's success.

Craig Olson snorted. "It felt great, ten years ago." Grissom winced, but the man did not seem remotely offended—he knew who he was speaking to, after all. "Listen, we had a case come in at the end of my shift tonight and one of my more… ambitious CSIs said he thought it reminded him of a couple murders in Vegas, though he didn't have the particulars because there was no trial—you guys never had any viable suspects, I think he said."

Grissom mmm-ed his response, trying to think of two unsolved cases from his shift, wondering if perhaps Craig ought to have been patched through to the dayshift supervisor. Craig beat him to the punch however, clearing his throat. "One victim was a minor, so his name wasn't released, but I gave the other name to your Director—"

"Assistant Director," Grissom corrected, automatically, making the man on the other end chuckle.

"Yeah, he didn't seem to think too much of you either. But he said your shift had taken it. Calvin Wright."

The name did it for him. Sara and Greg had worked it, before their team had come back together, back when they were so busy that Grissom could not adequately keep track of more than just the ten cases he was juggling at any given time. But he remembered the name, because he and Sara had fought about this one—she wanted to keep it open and active, even when they had no leads and no time to spare. She had been convinced it had been a serial—she had two, Calvin and Vince, the minor, that struck her as eerily similar. But without a third…

"I remember it. You're thinking serial?"

Craig made a noise in his throat, like he didn't want to commit to anything. "Not necessarily. Just covering my bases—my young CSI insisted that it was important, but we really don't have enough information to make a judgment either way. You wanna walk me through them?"

"No, actually. Let me see if I can grab the lead on those… I think I saw her in a layout room."

"Great." Craig said, and Grissom put him on hold.

He found Sara right where he expected, bent over a blood spattered shirt in a layout room, eyeing the fabric closely. He knocked on the door jamb, making her jump and spin around. He smiled at her startled expression, understanding all too well how consumed in her work she had been only a moment before. "Oh, god, Grissom! You scared the hell out of me!"

His smile widened, just a little. "Can I steal you for a moment?"

Greg stepped into the room. "I dropped off the prints with Mandy. Where were we?"

Sara smiled at her young protégé. "Go ahead and process the shirt. I need to step out for a second."

The young CSI nodded, recognizing Sara's 'mentor voice' when he heard it, and got right to work. Sara, for her part, dutifully removed her gloves and slid them into a manila envelope, sealing it and taking the time to write the details on the front before signing the tape, following protocol to the letter. Then, finally, she turned to Grissom. "Lead the way."

He lead her out of the room and in the direction of his office. "I got a call from Ecklie tonight—"

"Don't you mean from Catherine?" She threw out, a bit contemptuously, and his lips quirked even as his heart warmed at Sara's unwavering loyalty. He nodded his acquiescence, suspecting that she had probably denied Ecklie the use of her phone, and continued.

"An old colleague of mine from Hennepin County wants to hear about a couple of our unsolveds—he's got a young CSI who thinks their case might be connected."

"Oh? Which cases?" She asked, just as they stepped into his office and he pulled the door closed behind him.

"The two young boys—Calvin Wright and Vincent Lomman."

No sooner had the names left his mouth than Sara was looking at him with bright, fervent eyes. "And they think there's a connection? I _told_ you it was a serial, Grissom!"

"Don't get ahead of the evidence." He reminded her, mildly, but she was already around his desk, slumping into his chair like she owned it and picking up the phone receiver, pressing the button to remove the hold.

"Sara Sidle speaking."

Grissom took a moment just to watch her while she spoke, fidgeting with the same corner of his blotter that he had. Her hair was doing that in-between thing again, where it only curled at the ends, and he never could decide if it was more graceful or sexy that way. Her straight hair, especially long, always made him picture her as some ethereal being… and her curls invariably had him wanting to toss her into bed and rumple them further. But right now, he just wanted to get close enough to breathe in the scent, as he had had the privilege of doing on only a couple occasions in the years he'd known her. She was focused, her whole body leaning into the phone call, describing the two scenes in detail with that all-but-photographic memory of hers. Her forehead was creased in the way he had learned meant she was more involved that was strictly advisable, but from the sounds she was now making—affirmations and detailed questions—he thought it was safe to assume that the scene in Minneapolis matched the two scenes here.

It was another several minutes before he heard Sara thanking Craig and the end of the phone call nearing. She held the receiver out to him when she finished, and she left almost immediately when he took it from her, presumably to check up on Greg's progress on the shirt. He brought the phone back up to his ear. "Craig?"

"Listen, Gil, I'm gonna be honest with you. We're extremely short and I've got a Level One working this solo right now. I mean, he's brilliant, but he's new, you know? I'd really appreciate some assistance from someone with eyes already on this case, and your CSI… Sara? She sounds like she knows what she's doing. Can I convince you to send her to me for a week or so, to take this over for me?"

Grissom frowned, digging beneath stacks of paper to find his scheduling calandar. It was already turned to December, and glancing at the dates over the next couple weeks, he sighed. It was the first time Sara had requested time off over Christmas since she started, and he was reluctant to send her away for an indefinite amount of time when she had earned this time off.

"Listen, Craig, with Christmas coming up… it's just not a really good time. She's got vacation time pretty soon here, and I don't want this to cut into it."

At the man's frustrated groan, Grissom felt a little guilty. Not for Craig—he hadn't considered the man a friend for many, many years—but because he knew exactly what Sara would say if she were here. …She would be angry that he was sacrificing justice for Vince and Calvin just to make sure she took a few vacation days. With irritation, he volunteered himself instead.

"…I can probably work things out here for me to come and help with it. I've got a great supervisor on my team who will be thrilled to be in charge. …Especially since she's not getting Christmas off." He added, with only minor vindictiveness. If he could get back in time for Christmas, he would of course send Catherine home to Lindsey. Hell, chances were that they'd be so slow that she'd be able to go home anyway. But if not, well… that was what she got for consorting with the enemy.

Craig wavered. "I mean, no offense Gil—we'd be lucky to have you, no question. But I was kind of hoping for someone with particular expertise with _these_ cases…"

Grissom shook his head; Sara needed the time. "Well, I'll make sure I'm an expert before I fly out. Now, I imagine your lab will be funding this…" Craig laughed, and told Grissom that if he didn't mind sleeping in a room he could rent for twenty bucks a night, he would be more than happy to foot the bill.

He caught Catherine just on her way out of the locker room and steered her back inside, glancing around and seeing no one. "I'm gonna need you to cover shift for a while."

She raised a haughty eyebrow. "How long is a while?"

"A week or two. I'm going to be consulting on a case in Minneapolis."

"That's going to fall over Christmas."

Grissom smiled. "If I'm not back, yes, it will. But Nick and Greg have both volunteered to work, so you'll probably be able to head home anyway. It looks like we might have a serial case so…"

"Is that my case?" came an unexpected voice, echoing from the back of the locker room where Sara had just stepped out of the shower, apparently. Her hair was wet and the air wafting from her direction was warm and sweet-smelling and moist. Grissom cleared his throat uncomfortably, and Catherine seemed to find Sara's anger an adequate punishment for her long-time friend's untimely absence. With a slightly giddy smile, she patted his shoulder and headed out, calling over her shoulder that she would take shift, but that he'd better be back by the morning of the 24th.

He barely heard her—Sara was still watching him, and her eyes were hurt and accusing. "Sara," he started, but she cut him off.

"_You_ are going to help with _my_ serial case. …The one you didn't even think was a serial. …The one you didn't know enough about to explain to that guy without coming to get me. I… I don't believe this. Do you… think I'm not capable? Do you not want me spending time with people from your past? Is it because of what I'll find out about you through them, or simply because you're embarrassed to have them see who you work with now…?"

Grissom was absolutely bewildered. It had never, ever occurred to him that Sara would think this way. It took him several seconds to even process her words, much less come up with a response. Sara, thankfully (or perhaps not), had lately developed a patience with him that had previously eluded her. And so she waited, silent and expectant, for him to find his words.

"I… didn't want this running over Christmas, leaving you stranded when you… have plans, this year." Grissom managed, uncertainly, wishing he had had the foresight to see this coming—that he'd known she was in the shower or that he'd just waited to call Catherine to ask her to cover until after he'd had a chance to talk to Sara.

Sara, for her part, had the good graces to look embarrassed at her outburst, but she did not back down entirely. She didn't want to get stuck in Minneapolis over Christmas, but she also didn't want to give up this case. Her eyes told Grissom exactly how personal this was for her. She cleared her throat. "I, ah… If we both go then… maybe we'll wrap it up before Christmas. I mean, I know the case, but you know the area, right?"

Grissom was so bewildered by this new suggestion that he said he'd mention it, never believing for a moment that Ecklie would agree. He was just happy that agreeing to mention it had seemed to quell any anger she had directed at him.

And he never was entirely sure how he _did_ get Ecklie to agree to it. He knew that Craig having finally, in seriousness, agreed to pay his way out there helped—because Grissom had known that Ecklie would have footed the bill happily anyway; sending Grissom out raised the prestige of the lab, and Conrad knew that. Maybe it was the fact that graveyard had survived with only four CSIs before, and the fact that Catherine had proven herself a competent supervisor, and the fact that Greg was no longer strictly in training, but could be trusted on scenes by himself, for the most part. Maybe Conrad just wanted the pair of them out of his hair (of lack thereof, Grissom thought with a smirk, running a hand through his own still-thick curls), and had accepted this as an early Christmas present.

Still, it was with absolute surprise that Grissom awkwardly placed the call to Sara's cell, which went to voicemail—an oddity—later that very morning to tell her that they'd be flying out that evening. He absolutely wasn't sure about this; by no stretch of the imagination would he have willingly put himself in this position—an indefinite amount of time with Sara, where he was the only person in town that she knew, and the only case they were working was together, with a rookie thrown in more as a matter of course than as an actual participant. To be quite frank, it was scaring the hell out of him.

But, within twenty minutes she had returned his call, also surprised at the speed at which things were moving, but otherwise excited, seeming to carry none of the worries that plagued him. She asked briefly about what she should pack, and then excused herself to get to it, and Grissom was left in silence to develop his ulcer.


	3. Chapter Two

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: So, okay, it might be a little slow right now, but I promise it'll pick up. Also, I'm about done with my next chapter of Attrition, so thus far it is serving its purpose.

Thanks to everyone for the feedback! Hope you enjoy!

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Chapter Two:

Sara had been in the shower when Grissom called.

Yeah, she'd taken one at the lab, but after their… confrontation… this morning, she'd had trouble getting to sleep. But it had been several days since she'd gotten more than a couple hours, and she'd been desperate. So, she'd crawled out of bed and into her sweats to go for a run. She was exhausted when she came back, but took the time to shower, blow-dry her hair, and then eat something. Her eyes were drooping heavily while she slipped into her most comfortable pajamas and back into bed, only then noticing the phone that she'd tossed onto her bedspread on her way to the bathroom.

She was frustrated when she saw the missed call. She was exhausted. She hadn't been out of the lab for more than a few hours, and even with her insomnia, could not be expected to be fresh for a new scene. Working straight through on a case was one thing—sometimes the evidence was time sensitive—but she loathed picking up the slack for dayshift and using up her limited monthly overtime in the process. When was the last time grave had called in someone from days just because they were swamped? Hell, for a while she and Grissom and Sophia (Greg didn't count, he never took cases alone back then) were doing the work of six CSIs and Grissom still managed to "lend" her out to Catherine on the fateful night of her suspension.

Regardless, she dialed the number for her voicemail while trekking to her closet to pull out a clean pair of jeans—if Grissom had been called in during the day, it was likely a body in the desert, covered in bugs—to get ready to go. Not for the first time, she felt a strange sort of gratitude for her insomnia. She wasn't sure how she would keep up with the schedule if she actually slept.

_"Hey Sara, uh… It's Grissom. Ecklie gave us the go-ahead. Flight leaves tonight. … Uh… Pack a coat."_

Sara blinked in surprise and after a slack-jawed moment, cut off the voice asking her to save or delete and instead repeated the message. They were going to Minneapolis. With a frown of confusion, she hung up and dialed Grissom directly, looking for an explanation he seemed unable to provide—he was as confused as she was. He made some sort of joke about Ecklie granting himself an early Christmas present by getting rid of the pair of them for a couple weeks and Sara laughed her disbelief, frantically asking what to pack. He suggested a coat. Again. Sara rolled her eyes and ended the phone call—he must be tired, because he sounded strange.

She had expected that, despite her slight PMS-induced rant this morning, she would go to work tonight as she did every night and that very little was going to change. Grissom did, after all, have the seniority and the contacts. And the way Craig Olson had described his team and the CSI on the case in Minneapolis, he probably needed an accomplished CSI more than he needed an expert on the specific cases. She knew better than to expect that both she and Grissom would actually get to go. So although he had promised her that he would bring it up to Ecklie, Sara was by no means expecting that her errant suggestion would go anywhere. She wasn't happy that she'd be spending a couple weeks under Catherine's supervision as opposed to Grissom's, but the two women had made their peace after Nick's interment, and it was nothing she couldn't handle.

Despite her tired body, her mind was now working overtime, trying to remember each and every detail of the two cases in question and trying to imagine what the next two weeks held in store for her. Though she had spoken in anger earlier that morning, she felt like there might be some truth in her words, regardless. Would Grissom be weird about her meeting people from his past? Where would she fit in, in that dynamic? She bit her bottom lip, but refused to dwell on it. Her competence would speak for itself.

The next hour was spent in meticulous planning. Carefully, she pulled from drawers and closets, assembling two weeks' worth of outfits with scrupulous attention to detail—slacks and jeans lined up in two rows of seven, each with a shirt folded atop it, and a pair of underwear on top of that, chosen specifically for the outfit, taking into account underwear lines and the tightness of the pants and how low they slid when she crouched down. Socks were added next—normal sports socks with jeans, thin dress socks with slacks. She then packed them, before piling other necessities on top—extra socks and underwear, several pairs of pajamas, several sweatshirts, extra pairs of shoes, including her work boots—which she had no interest in pulling on and off in the security line—and after a certain amount of debate, a swim suit, a dressy shirt, and a pair of heels. She didn't expect to use any of them, necessarily, but she expected there to be a certain amount of downtime in which Grissom would sleep and she would not. A dip in the pool or the hot tub might be just the thing to get her to sleep after a long day, especially if the hotel they were in didn't have a gym of any kind. As for the dress clothes… Well, she didn't expect to need those either, but there was nothing worse than being caught unaware in an unfamiliar city. Sara Sidle had never been a girl scout, but she was nothing if not prepared.

An hour and a half after she got off the phone with Grissom, Sara had a large suitcase packed and sitting in her trunk, a duffle bag in her passenger seat containing travel-sized toiletries, a change of clothes, and entertainment for the plane. Her purse was next to the door, paired with her keys, cell phone, tennis shoes. She crawled into bed more out of a sense of obligation, now—she'd be much better on the case if she wasn't exhausted—but didn't really expect to fall asleep; she was too wound up. She kept trying to imagine a young Grissom—younger than even in San Francisco—fresh out of school and learning the ropes of being a criminalist. His curls were a little longer, and a little lighter—a golden brown, like warm honey—and he was clean shaven. He was a little slimmer, which made his shoulders seem broader, and he had an uncertain kind of smile that reminded her of Greg on his first cases. His hesitation matched with a vigor and devotion that was a little less controlled than she was used to made her smile wistfully. He was working with a faceless man named Craig under a Philip Gerard who looked exactly the same as she remembered, but with brown hair—wrinkles, cynical eyes, shameless self-interest—and brown hair.

She didn't realize she'd fallen asleep and dreamed most of this until her alarm broke through her awareness, right before she discovered how her mentor had lost a body… one of the only things she knew about Grissom's time in Minneapolis. With a soft sigh, she crawled out of bed and pulled her hair into a messy ponytail, dressing in her oldest, most comfortable pair of jeans and a well-worn, oversized Berkeley sweatshirt. A glance in the mirror made her second guess herself—maybe she should put on jeans without tears and a newer sweatshirt and makeup… and then she snorted and turned off the bathroom light, heading for her shoes. Despite the more relaxed nature of she and Grissom's professional relationship since her suspension and Nick's kidnapping, Sara knew better than to hope. And dressing up for Grissom would just make her hope. Instead, she would be comfy on the plane, and be in the right state of mind to field his flirting and double entendres, which had also returned in the last year. If she didn't hope, they were just idle verbal exercises—amusing, but meaningless. The way he obviously intended them.

She and Grissom had agreed to meet at the lab rather than both paying for long-term parking. They'd gather up any pertinent case information, and call a cab to take them over to McCarran. She was a little early, but she wouldn't mind having time to look over the evidence before they left, rather than just the documentation of said evidence that they'd be taking with them. She was surprised, though she shouldn't have been, to learn that the evidence had already been checked out. With a dry half-smile, Sara set off to find whichever layout room Grissom was in.

She found him frowning over her report, Calvin's shirt in front of him on the table. His right hand was gloved and clutched the shirt just beneath the collar, while the left was bare and held the pages. A tap on the doorway announced her entrance, and though he glanced at his watch, he did not seem remotely surprised to find her here. She slipped gloves on herself and cleared her throat as she did so. "I would have briefed you on the plane…"

He nodded, and even offered a slight smile. "I know… Call it ego. I don't want to go into this—helping out an old colleague—and not know what I'm doing."

Sara nodded. Call it ego, like he suggested, or anything else you liked, she would have been doing the same thing. Still, the way he was eyeing her report… "Did I miss something?"

He frowned. "I'm not sure. Your report speculated a hate crime as possible motive, stating that Calvin was homosexual. …But there's lipstick on his collar here."

Sara bit her lip slyly, "Yeah, that's in the report as well. It matched his boyfriend's shade, although DNA was too deteriorated to… What?"

He was watching her, closely, and after a moment let a soft smile grace his features and shook his head. "Nothing."

Her eyebrows immediately darted inward, though she did not feel like he was criticizing her, or laughing at her. He seemed… touched, almost. It was as emotional a moment as Sara had ever experienced with Grissom, with the rare exception of Nick's kidnapping. She wanted to push the issue, but he was already speaking again, his voice all business; the moment was gone. "What led you to connect the two cases, anyway? The boys are close in age, but they didn't look alike, go to the same school, or even live on the same side of town. One was from a wealthy family, the other lived with a single mother on food stamps…"

She shrugged, offering an uncertain smile—Was he doubting the connection or complimenting her? "They were both found in relatively the same area—within blocks of a gay bar. The, uh…" Her lips quirked. "Screwdriver." A grin slipped across her face, but after a second she refocused on the topic with the proper solemnity. "That got me thinking; Calvin was kind of a jock, but Vince was… flamboyant. So I showed some pictures around the bar. Apparently they're not too worried about letting in kids under 21, but they _are_ strict about kids under 18. They turned Vince away. Calvin was a regular, though. His boyfriend, Mark, told me as much, and the bartender at The… Screwdriver," her lips quirked again and this time Grissom's did too. "Verified that Calvin and Mark came in at least once a week."

Grissom opened his mouth to continue his questioning when the crash of a test tube shattering startled the pair, and he glanced awkwardly at his watch. "We should probably get going… I'll pack this up if you, uh, want to call a cab?"

Half an hour later, they found themselves checking in and checking luggage and then waiting, waiting in the long security lines. It was… awkward, Sara decided, choosing to eye the many advertisements for various Vegas shows and attractions rather than meeting Grissom's gaze. She knew that if she did, she would feel the need to fill the silence, and then she'd be overtalking and making a fool of herself and she'd have no escape from him for however long this ended up taking…

She hadn't necessarily considered how much down time there was on a trip. You didn't think about the lines and the waiting and all that time in which conversation was more or less… expected. She sighed softly as they moved another foot forward, trying to imagine what this trip might be like if she were standing beside one of her other colleagues.

Greg would be cracking jokes, telling her about the new list of bands he had in mind for her to listen to on the plane—furthering his attempts at what he called her "musical re-education". Sara didn't exactly have the heart to tell him that he'd still been eating his own boogers when she had listened to some of the stuff he was 'exposing' her to.

Nick would be refusing to let her carry any of her own luggage and would thus have his hands full, a duffle bag over each shoulder and a hand on the slide up handle of each large, rolling suitcase. He'd be telling her the back story on everyone she was likely—or even somewhat unlikely—to meet. He had had a rivalry with this person similar to the one they shared and he'd played ball with that person. He'd taken that girl out on a date but never called her because she was… Sara smirked, imagining how the Texan had trailed off in the middle of just such a discussion a few weeks ago at the diner. He'd been about to say that he hadn't called a girl—Jenna—after their date because she was "one of those health food nuts who thinks eating a steak is murder". He got so far as the word 'steak' before realizing his mistake. Sara had kicked him under the table and replied that Jenna probably hadn't wanted a dumb meathead jock like him to call her back anyway. Nick's salacious response, citing their goodnight kiss, had Greg snorting his laughter as his soda dribbled out of his nose, and Sara smiling begrudgingly.

Warrick would be quieter, but it would be a comfortable silence. He would probably have commandeered her duffle bag, but she would be pulling her suitcase and they might be quietly discussing the sights they might see, if there was some down time. Warrick would maybe tell a story or two of trouble he'd gotten into, and by the time they made it through security she would have been laughing and relaxed.

With Catherine, she would probably be on edge. Likely, she would be helping the woman manage the abundance of luggage she had brought and they'd both be struggling towards the ticket counter, Catherine still tossing her hair and Sara anxiously biting her tongue against any number of comments regarding Catherine's perception of the trip as a vacation rather than an investigation. She would probably be on the phone, arguing with Lindsey, which would save Sara the trouble of finding a conversation topic, though she would be actively dreading the fact that they would likely share a room—the county didn't like to spend money, especially not on CSIs, and having two female criminalists share a room was a no-brainer.

She bit her lip, chancing a glance at Grissom who, despite his relaxed face, had a strange sort of tension in his shoulders. Maybe they were making this much harder than it had to be. The truth of the matter was that this was work… and if they treated it that way, none of what never happened between them would get in the way. She cleared her throat and Grissom turned his gaze obligingly. "So… what's their lab like? Are we talking a huge step down, equipment-wise?"

He gave her a grateful smile, launching into what he remembered as well as his own speculation—the higher ranked the lab, the more grant money it received. Vegas was number two, just behind the FBI, and Hennepin County was roughly eleven, these days. So while it still garnered a decent amount of respect, grant money, and well-educated employees… Yes, Grissom thought, they might be talking a small step down. Sara grinned, mentally lowering her expectations, and tentatively asked about Craig in the least-personal way she could manage.

To her very great surprise, Grissom launched into a description of the man. It didn't include much personal information about Grissom himself or his relationship with him—only that the pair of them had been Level Ones at the same time, under Gerard—but it did manage to carry them through security. They found their gate, grabbed seats, and pulled out a forensics journal each. Sara let out a relieved breath through a sly smile. No, as long as she could keep him talking about work, this wasn't going to be nearly as bad as she'd initially feared.


	4. Chapter Three

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: Thank you guys for all the support! It means to much to me! Happy Thanksgiving to those of you in the states! Enjoy!

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Chapter Three:

"Gil!" Sara glanced up at the call, locating a large man waving rather frantically over near the baggage claim. He was overweight, but in the way that made you think of Santa, despite the fact that the thin hair ringing his head from ear to ear and entirely absent on top was golden blond. He had a bright smile and crinkles near his eyes—bright blue, almost as blue as Grissom's—and he was bundled up far warmer than Sara had imagined would be necessary on an expedition to the South Pole.

She glanced at Grissom in time to see him mask his cringe for a close-lipped smile. She smirked. "You know, when visiting experts come to Vegas, _you_ don't greet _them_ at the airport…"

His lips twitched. "They're lucky if we send a rookie out for them."

Sara snorted, following Grissom over to the beaming man. When Grissom had called her in from San Francisco, she had not gotten a rookie… she'd taken a cab to the lab, only to be told that Grissom had not left any instructions for her, but she was welcome to try and find him at his scene. It had taken her roughly half an hour of toting her bags around that hotel before she realized there was an entire other section she'd been unaware of. She'd crossed a pool area full of barely-clad tourists and finally found his dummy-throwing experiment.

She found herself genuinely amused rather than frustrated that she'd trekked all over Las Vegas to find him when he could have been doing the same thing on a computer in the lab, and that was when she had known that he was more than just her friend. …That he had maybe never been _just_ a friend, ever.

The large man extended both hands out as soon as they neared, capturing Grissom's hand in his right and clasping it with his left. "Gilbert Grissom, back up North, eh? You look the part, too! Like a lumberjack. Paul Bunyan chic."

Grissom ran a rueful hand over his beard and glanced awkwardly at Sara, who put on her brightest smile and stepped forward, hand out. "Hi. I guess that would make me the blue ox, right? Sara Sidle… You're Craig Olson?"

He grinned, taking the proffered hand. "You're Babe, huh?"

She blinked, a frown bending her eyebrows down in disapproval, despite her attempts to disguise it out of politeness. Her opinion of the man immediately shifted, her tone become a little cold. "Excuse me?"

Grissom chuckled at that, finally seeming to relax a little. "Babe, Sara. Paul Bunyan's Big Blue Ox. …The one you just referenced."

"Oh." She blushed, swallowing. "Right. I… didn't remember the name, I just remember the pictures. You've got a lot of statues of those two up here…"

Craig grinned. "Imagine processing one of those, eh? Come on, your luggage should be coming up by now…" And the jovial man took off towards their carousel, expecting the pair to follow them. Sara chanced a glance at her mentor who, to her great surprise, was grinning slyly at her.

"After you, _Babe._"

Sara rolled her eyes for his benefit and stalked off, hitching her duffle bag up higher on her shoulder. Yeah, it was just the kind of flippant, off-the-cuff thing Grissom was prone to say as if it were nothing—Because it _was_ nothing, she told herself—but it still had her heart hammering a little quicker in her chest. Stupid Paul Bunyan.

Craig dropped them at their hotel to check in and Grissom—in a move that rather surprised Sara—managed to finagle them some adjoining rooms, despite the time of night. To Sara's surprise, the man followed them up in the elevator, not discussing the case yet—just talking about restaurants. …At which point it occurred to Sara that he expected them to go out for supper with him. Not that that was necessarily a problem—she was used to working nights, so she wouldn't be able to sleep anyway—but she looked like a sloppy college student right now, except with, you know, a few more wrinkles here or there. So when Craig followed Grissom into his room, Sara slipped into the one next to it and dug through her suitcase. A jacket thrown over the tank top she'd had on all day and a new pair of jeans—and a fresh swipe of deodorant—and she felt much more like the young professional she liked to believe she was. She had put away her travelling clothes before Grissom knocked on the door separating their rooms, and she opened it with a fresh, polite smile.

After all, she'd already kind of made a fool of herself. She needed to redeem herself—not so much to Grissom. She knew that he knew she was smart and a talented criminalist. Whatever else his faults, he had become much more generous with compliments in the last few months. No, she wanted to impress Craig, the same as she'd wanted to impress every teacher she'd ever had, Grissom included. That was part of the reason she had such a problem with authority—if they didn't warrant her admiration—her desire for validation—then they didn't really deserve to be telling her what to do anyway. …Ecklie, for example.

She felt her smile become a little more vindictive at that, and forced herself to pay attention to the conversation at hand. Grissom—again, to her great surprise—apparently had no intentions of living out of a suitcase. He had already placed his toiletries around the sink in the bathroom to be organized later, and was carefully hanging shirts and piling other clothing into dresser drawers. Though Sara didn't like the idea of living out of a suitcase for two weeks, she also didn't like the idea of putting her clothes anywhere near hotel drawers. …Maybe after Grissom had gone to bed, she'd process them and see whether it was worth the risk.

"—best steak in town, I guarantee it!"

Sara's head snapped up, realizing that she'd just missed something important. Were they headed to a steak place? Or just talking about one. She could handle her dining partners consuming meat without issue, but steak houses were a little overwhelming. The scent of cooked flesh hung in the air like smog. Even the diner—with the overwhelming aroma of bacon—wasn't as bad as a steak house.

"How about your vegetarian fare?"

Craig went off about fantastic pasta places instead, but Sara watched Grissom, waiting for him to look at her, because of course it was coming. He waited no longer than a second or so to glance up at her, and when their eyes met she fit _it_, and it took her breath away. A moment later, of course, it was gone. It was always like that, and it happened more and more often lately… moments that would hit them, collectively, and they would be reminded of all the potential between them, if briefly and fleetingly so.

Craig was already extolling the virtues of a place downtown and within moments they were being shuffled back into their coats and out of their rooms. Craig, for his part, seemed to be a gentleman through and through—he offered Sara his arm as soon as they left the room, and when she blinked in surprise and looked moderately baffled at just what he expected her to do, he acquiesced and put his hand to the middle of her back instead to guide her. Which irked her, once her brain caught up with her—it had been a rather long, mind-numbing flight—and she realized that through some old-world sense of gentility and by virtue of her having a vagina between her thighs rather than a penis, he assumed that she would not find her way back to the elevators and down to the lobby without his guidance. She allowed it because she didn't know the man—if it had been one of the guys, she might have broken the offending hand.

As if he could read her mind, Grissom chuckled behind them, and Sara rolled her eyes.

He was not a CSI for nothing though—the first door he opened for her, he noticed her tensing shoulders, and backed off enough for Sara to relax and realize that he had probably only intended to be polite and welcoming. She was a little on edge—she could already feel the dull ache in her lower back that told her that not only was her period on the way, but that the cramps were going to be bad. …Had she remembered to pack the bottle of Tylenol? She frowned, trying to remember, and missed the fact that Craig had opened her car door for her.

The lack of a scowl on her face at his action made Grissom frown, but she didn't notice that either. She was almost certain she had forgotten the painkillers.

The food was actually just as good as Craig had promised, though Sara had suspected the man of being a little… overenthusiastic. He certainly didn't come off this…expressive… on the phone. Despite the serious nature of their business there, Sara actually found herself having fun. It had been a very long time since she'd gone out with adults and had an intellectually stimulating conversation—the guys were as smart as anything, but they didn't enjoy discussing the newest articles in Forensic journals or taking on deep philosophical considerations over dinner. They were more about cracking jokes over drinks, which was good—they were the best friends she'd ever had—but this… this was easier, for Sara. It was the kind of social situation she could feel completely at home in, and it was this, more than the glass of wine Craig had insisted she try with her pasta-had she mentioned that she didn't much care for wine?-that had her relaxing into the moment.

She shivered on the way out of the restaurant, and Grissom eyed her coat with noticeable contempt. "You know, that's really not warm enough for the weather up here."

Sara raised her eyebrows at him, frowing slightly. "It's the best I've got. You know, it's not exactly easy to find winter jackets in Vegas—especially when you're given about twelve hours' notice."

"Mmm," he said, and Sara rolled her eyes behind his back, feeling the flare of irritation again.

It was really cold, and her back was aching, and by the time she seated herself in the car, she knew she'd need to open her box of tampons when they got back to the hotel. With a scowl at the drifts of icy, white snow they passed on their way back, Sara thought that maybe Grissom had been right to volunteer himself, alone, for this trip. Winter in Vegas wasn't warm by any stretch of the imagination, but the lab-issued Forensics jacket was a lot thicker than her own personal coat, and right now she would probably be about done processing a scene—maybe even one she'd been given lead on. Sure, she'd still be irritable and achy—but she'd have access to Tylenol from her locker, and that always made a world of difference. Plus she wouldn't have spent hours on a cramped plane that absolutely didn't have enough room for her long legs.

Craig dropped them at the door to their hotel, not accompanying them in this time, though Sara had a suspicion that he might have walked her to her door if she'd responded better to his masculine ogre-ing earlier in the night. In relative silence, she walked with Grissom through the mostly deserted lobby—it was just after ten at night—and into the elevator. He pushed their floor number and the doors slid closed. Sara sighed. "He's… exhausting."

Grissom surprised her by grinning. "He's actually mellowed, a bit, with age. He was like Greg after a couple shots of espresso back when we started." He chuckled at some memory that she wished she could share, but she smiled anyway.

"Sometimes I picture you a little like Greg, when you were a level one." She chanced a glance at him, noting his raised eyebrow and choosing to interpret it as a response to the Greg comparison rather than to the fact that she'd admitted to imagining him and his past. "What? Quirky, brilliant, misunderstood…"

Grissom tried very hard to frown and failed, the corners of his mouth turning up as the elevator doors slid open. "I have suffered from being misunderstood, but I would have suffered a hell of a lot more if I had been understood." Sara recognized his quote-voice with a smile and raised her eyebrow in the question. "Clarence Darrow."

She smiled and shook her head as they reached their doors and muttered somewhat awkward goodnights. They moved in and each closed their doors behind them… before realizing that the doors adjoining their rooms were still wide open. Sara chuckled, kicking off her shoes and moving over to close it, coming face to face with a Grissom who had his fist raised to knock on the doorjamb. She quirked a smile after blinking in surprise, but Grissom blushed and looked a little sheepish.

"Sorry, I, uh… I think Craig was planning on sending a cadet over with a lab vehicle, around eight a.m. I… They have a continental breakfast, downstairs." He left the suggestion—or the hint of one—hovering in the air uncertainly. And he was extremely thankful when Sara picked it up easily.

"Great. Do you want to meet downstairs around seven thirty then?"

"Yeah. Absolutely." He said, and then quirked his lips awkwardly—not in a smile, but almost like he wished he hadn't spoken. Sara smiled, appreciating the rare exuberance, even as she recognized his regret for displaying it. And despite herself, she sought to prolong their contact, just a little.

"I, ah… was surprised. They do things differently here. I figured we'd be carted off, straight to the lab, to get to work."

He smiled. "They have a much lower crime rate than Vegas—they can afford to take time over cases. And, I suppose, Craig figures that if it is a serial, we've got some time." At her raised eyebrow, he smiled. "He's escalating, yes, but slowly. There was a month between Vince and Calvin, three weeks between Calvin and their vic up here… even if he keeps with his pattern, we've got a couple weeks. And Craig doesn't work the night shift—I spose he figures it makes more sense to wait."

"Ah." She said, not really knowing what else to say. His explanation made sense, of course, but it didn't dampen her desire to hop in a cab and storm into the lab now. This relaxed atmosphere didn't sit right with her, in part because she was so used to the pace in Vegas, and in part because her fervor for justice had been building since she'd heard about the possible serial connection—she was nearly at a breaking point now.

"Well, uh…" Grissom hesitated. "I guess… Goodnight." It wasn't exactly a question, but it wasn't fully a statement either, and Sara clung to it.

"I, um… probably won't sleep much. At least not soon. I slept this afternoon, so…" She bit her bottom lip and chanced a glance at him. He was expressionless. "So, you know, if you can't sleep…" She lost her nerve then, and shrugged awkwardly instead of finishing the invitation. He nodded, uncertainly, and their respective doors closed between them.

With a sigh, Sara pressed herself against the wood as quietly as she could, imagining him on the other side, kicking off his shoes and unbuttoning his shirt—her eyes closed tightly at that; she was aware of the little bit of weight he'd put on in recent years, and yet the thought of his bare chest and stomach never failed to make her _want_—turning on the television and settling onto the bed.

For what could easily be the ten thousandth time, Sara wished things were different.


	5. Interlude One

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: Once again, thanks to Pati for making sure this made sense. Thanks for all the reviews! Hope you guys enjoy! :)

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Interlude 1:

"There's, uh… a fireplace, in the bedroom." Sara offered, and Grissom blinked in surprise.

"There is? It's not electric, is it?"

"I… guess I didn't check. I don't think so."

Grissom didn't speak, he just gestured that she should lead him to it. She turned back to the hallway and guided him to the largest bedroom. He moved past where she stood in the doorway and shined his flashlight on the fireplace. No glass, no screen. He reached in, thankful to find it dry inside. He tested the damper—it was closed, but it opened with a light creak. When he turned his face back to look at her, Sara could see the relief on his face without a flashlight.

"This is good. We'll need… matches. And kindling. Can you look around for whatever will work?"

"I… sure, but what are you—"

"I'm going to go look for firewood. Hopefully there's some here and it isn't soaked through from the weather. That'll last longer than breaking up furniture, and we won't have to worry about chemical fumes from paint or… whatever."

"You can't go outside!" Sara would be the first to admit that she didn't have the survival know-how for a blizzard, but she had read the Little House books when she was little and the library had been like a second home to her—she knew that people got lost in blizzards. She knew that Pa had tied a rope between the house and the stable to feed the animals, because he could walk right past in and get lost in the swirling, blinding white if he tried to make the trip alone.

She would rather freeze to death than have Grissom wander away, into the storm.

Grissom offered her a smile that seemed… appreciative. He recognized her concern for what it was. "I'll only be a minute—if there isn't any firewood along the side of the house, I won't go out looking for more, okay? We'll find something else."

Sara was frightened, but she couldn't see another alternative… unless—"Let me go out and look." Grissom could stay inside, nice and warm, and she would take the risk. Of the two of them, she was the more expendable.

His eyes crinkled along the sides as he watched her with a softness that made her tremble inside. "Honey, your coat isn't warm enough for a winter in San Francisco… I promise, this isn't a misguided attempt at chivalry, it's… Well, it's the best we've got. I promise, if I'm not back in ten, fifteen minutes tops, you can come after me, okay?"

Sara swallowed. They both knew that he wouldn't make that kind of offer if he wasn't certain he'd be back—he wouldn't put it past Sara to carefully document each moment he was gone. Hesitantly, she nodded, and he offered her a hesitant smile while he tugged his hat more firmly over his ears, fastened his hood over that, and zipped his coat up all the way. Then he pulled on heavy gloves and, with a nod at her, opened the door once more. The wind was howling and she shivered from the cold he let in when he stepped out in what looked like an absolute sea of snow, whipping through the air.

What had the weatherman said, as she'd fiddled with the radio on the drive out here? Temperatures pushing fifty below, wind up to 45 miles per hour. This storm would be some kind of record, wouldn't it? It had to be. No one could live here if this were the norm.

The door snapped shut and Sara peered at her watch in the darkness. 9:57. He had fourteen minutes before she went after him.

She found kindling right away—there was a large bookshelf in the living room, right beside the door, and only about half the books seemed wet from the leaking roof and the snow they themselves had let in. She piled up the dry ones in her numb, thinly-gloved hands, and carried them to the bedroom, setting them on the bed. She figured matches would either be in the kitchen or in the store room, so she went to the kitchen first. Another glance at her watch—10:04. His time was already half up. The cupboards were mostly empty, though she did manage to remove several cans in her search. No matches.

Another look—10:08. It had been eleven minutes. He should be back by now. She gnawed her bottom lip. If he did find firewood, he'd want to start a fire right away—she should go look in the store room.

She moved back to the musty smelling room, shining her flashlight up on the shelves. As she had seen on first inspection, there were bottles of cleaning supplies. Though she didn't want to get closer, she climbed up on an overturned bucket, peering behind, hoping to find a godsend here.

"Ahhhh!" She screamed, tipped the bucket, and crumpled onto her back onto the floor, before scrambling out of the room and slamming the door. Up on the shelf, Sara had come upon a large, dead rat. She shivered, berating herself for her foolish reaction, and looked at her watch in anger. 10:13. He was a minute late. She marched to the door in anger—or was it panic?—and pulled it open with force, just in time to see Grissom stumbling towards her with a handful of firewood.

"You found some?"

He nodded, his teeth chattering, his cheeks red, his beard white with snow. "I had to crawl way back in the wood bin—this is all that's left." Unceremoniously, he dropped the wood directly onto the floor, like his arms could not hold it any longer.

Sara eyed the seven or eight large pieces of wood, noting the ice clinging to them. Would they burn, or just smoke? "There aren't any matches, here." That was the more pressing issue; without matches, there wouldn't even be smoke. Grissom met her gaze, and though she expected him to question where she'd looked or double check for himself, he simply nodded, displaying absolute trust.

"They should have a winter safety kit standard in the lab vehicle. I'll run out and get it."

"Let me go. You've been out in the cold."

"You need to try and break the ice from the wood—my fingers are numb. I'd be no good at it."

She opened her mouth to argue, but he'd already turned and slipped out into the cold again. Abandoning the wood, Sara rushed to the window to see out—to watch and make sure he didn't miss the SUV… but she couldn't see him or it through the window. Tears pricked her eyes, but she fought them back. Grissom knew what he was doing. He had trusted her, and she needed to trust him. She moved to the wood pile on the floor and tried first to pry the ice away, and then to break it, slamming the pieces against the floor. It worked—a little—but she suspected that it would not be immediately helpful. Giving the door another worried glance, Sara turned her attention to the furniture in the room.

The couch and chairs were out—chemicals in the fabric and the glues would pose a risk. The bookcase by the door was likely wet, and looked purchased, rather than built. Paint and glaze and whatever else. The table and chairs, however, looked rough. Sanded, but homemade. She frowned. There was no way to be absolutely certain which would be the most harmful, but Grissom had looked so cold…

She lifted a chair and brought it down, full force, to the floor. It bounced. She grit her teeth and put her body into it. It cracked. The next time, it cracked in half. A few more well-aimed hits and she had the chair in pieces. She was just debating between carrying the pieces into the room and running out after Grissom when the door opened, yet again, and he slammed it behind him. In his hand was a medium-sized black case. He didn't seem fazed by the wood splinters all over the floor; he just moved to the table and pulled off his gloves, trying several times to pull the zipper and open the case.

He couldn't.

This set off Sara's alarm bells. "Here, Griss. I'll do it. You put these on." She handed him her gloves which were thin, but probably much drier than his. He looked like he wanted to argue, but didn't—he shoved his hands into the garments and clenched his jaw. Another glance at him told Sara how cold he was… all of him, not just his hands.

"Come on. Let's bring this to the back bedroom, get you under some blankets, okay?"

He shook his head, but when Sara ignored him, scooping up the case and tugging on his arm, he followed. He sat on the bed and Sara took up the blanket from the other side of the bed and draped it over his shoulders. "I'll be right back."

Hurrying out to the living room, she struggled to carry the firewood and her broken chair pieces in one trip, but managed to collect it all and stumble her way back to the bedroom. Grissom still hadn't moved, and it worried her. Another anxious glance at the man and she tore open the case, digging through it. There were a lot of things she wasn't sure they could use—a flare, a first aid kit, a small box of… kitty litter? But there were also spare flashlight batteries and a few Hershey's bars and finally—a completely full, dry box of matches.

"Here, Griss, I've got matches. You're gonna be warm soon, I promise."

He nodded, eyes closed, and Sara turned to the fireplace. She picked up a book on jet ski maintenance and with little ceremony ripped into it, tearing the pages and piling them within the fireplace. Her now-much-colder fingers stumbled with the matches, but after a failed attempt in which she pushed too hard and snapped the little stick in half, she managed to light one and transfer it to the paper. It immediately lit and curled and Sara cursed herself for doing this wrong—she should have put the wood in first. Almost as quickly as the fire had started, it exhausted its fuel and died.

Tamping down her frustration, she piled pieces of the chair, one on top of the other, and stuck more pages of the book around the base and down in between the wooden pieces, hoping the wood would catch quickly—or at least that she could add kindling quickly enough to keep it going until the wood did catch. Another match, and this time she was much more successful. The large pieces did not light right away, but the splintered bars that had made up the back rest caught with only a little prodding, and Sara let herself relax, just a little.

Grissom was still shivering.

She eyed the man, noticing first that he was wet to his knees from the snow he'd walked and crawled through. "Come on, Griss. You can't stay in your wet clothes."

He blinked slowly at her and she moved to his feet, pulling off his shoes that were caked in ice and slippery now as his body heat slowly melted it. His socks came next—his feet weren't freezing, but they weren't warm. "Stand up. You have to take your pants off… and your coat."

He blinked at her and she got impatient, reaching for his belt. He caught her wrist. "I can do it."

She blushed and turned away. "Maybe there are some spare clothes left here… I'll look."

Digging through drawers while she listened to the man behind her undress in what could have been the most sensual moment of her life—and yet wasn't—Sara reflected once again at the foolishness of their actions tonight. She managed to find several pairs of thick socks and several pairs of long underwear—and nothing else. Well, it would be better than nothing.

She turned and headed back, eyes on the floor, and passed him the bottoms of the long underwear, watching his shadow in the firelight on the floor as he slipped into them. Next, she passed him two pairs of the wooly socks and watched him sit back on the bed to slide first one pair and then the other on. She set the remaining clothes—her own set of long underwear and socks as well as the top of his long underwear—on the bed and moved to the fire, adding more pages from the book and shifting wood around. When she turned around, Grissom was watching her.

She smiled awkwardly. "Once we get this fire going, we might be able to make some food… there were cans in the kitchen. I don't know how good they are but… I mean, that stuff's supposed to last forever, right?"

He nodded. "Did you see any other blankets in the house? We need as many as we can get—and we need to cover the windows, here. I think there's a draft."

"Okay. I'm on it." He nodded again and moved to stand, but she shook her head. "Griss, your shoes are soaked. You're freezing. Stay here." He opened his mouth and she stepped forward, more forcefully. "Grissom, you need to save your strength, because I don't know what I'm doing here—so we're not arguing about this. Get it bed. Warm up. I'll be back."

He must have been really cold, Sara thought, as she slipped from the room and moved next door, collecting the blankets from the children's beds—they were in bad shape. So thin that it would likely take both of them to combat the draft in the windows. He would not have agreed so readily if he weren't colder than he looked. The worry of that truth gnawed on her as she moved, and once again her exhaling huff came out bright and visible, mocking her.

Whatever happened here tonight, she was going to take care of Grissom. He had saved her, time and again, and though she was ill-prepared and knew it—hated it—she also knew that she would do anything to keep him safe. The wind howling outside was an ominous challenge to her thoughts and she raised her chin to meet it, defiant.


	6. Chapter Four

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: Sooo, once again I'm sorry for the delay. Finals week was crazy, but I'm crossing my fingers for a 4.0 sooo... :) Hope you guys enjoy this chapter. I had fun with it.

As always, I want to thank Pati, my more-than-a-beta and friend.

* * *

Chapter Four:

"Dr. Grissom. Such a pleasure. I saw you speak at the Entomology Conference in Duluth four years ago. You were just amazing."

Grissom blinked in surprise at the young man ringing his hand like he'd just met… Roy Rogers? Who were the childhood heroes, nowadays? At his bewildered look, the young man smiled sheepishly. "I was in school in Duluth at the time. Even if you don't dig insects, if you're studying to be a criminalist and Gil Grissom is in town, lecturing on his branch of entomology—Well, you make it a point to be there."

Grissom nodded, wondering how anyone had known he would be in town for that conference. "…And your name was…?"

"Oh! I'm sorry! Name's Nolan Hjelmstad. I was the one who guessed at the connection. I read the crime sections of most major newspapers in my free time and—Sara Sidle, I presume?" He switched tack mid-sentence as Sara and Craig joined them, bearing the coffee and doughnuts she had helped him retrieve from the break room for the four of them. Craig closed the conference room door while Sara offered her hand to the young man.

"Nice to meet you, …"

"Nolan." He supplied. "Hjelmstad." He added, as an afterthought. "I know you don't know me, but I certainly know you—any time you've been published, I've read it. Your articles on the cannibal cheerleader and the hit and run victim who bled out in the guy's garage… man. I mean, it's not like reading a boring, professional article, though I always feel like I've learned something—your righteous anger and longing for justice just… jump off the page. I'm… _so_ happy to meet you."

Grissom found a slow grin sliding over his face as Sara's eyes got wider and wider. She was not used to be fawned over, though Grissom knew that Nolan was not the first nor would he be the last to follow Sara professionally. At several conventions he'd heard praise about his CSI, "S. Sidle", who refused to use her first name so that others' readings of her analysis would not be biased by her sex. The one who makes criminalists feel like they actually get to make a difference. She might not be well-known by sight, but academically she was something of a star in the forensics world.

She just didn't know it. …Probably because he liked to keep her in Vegas as much as possible.

He scowled and pushed the thought away. He was not particularly in a mood to examine all the times and reasons he had suggested someone else go speak at a conference instead of her. Especially since things had been surprisingly peaceful for them for a while now. He wasn't going to work himself up, get upset, and then take it out on her and ruin the happy medium they'd found.

"I, uh… Thank you. I… Thank you. You're the one who noticed the connection between the cases?"

"Oh, yeah." He blushed a little, though she had offered no explicit compliment. "Here, let me show you what we've got." He hurried up around the table to take a file from the top of a large, white cardboard box of evidence, still sealed. He flipped it open, but did not glance at it as he spoke.

"Collin Almquist. Eighteen year old freshman at U of M. He was found a couple blocks from a drag show the Theatre Department put on. His parents informed me that he'd been open with them about his sexuality since he was fifteen, but that he'd been unsure about how _out_ he should be at school. Apparently he was too much so."

Grissom nodded, taking in the details—similar age, somewhat similar location… cause of death? But before he could ask, Sara was shaking her head.

"Too much so? Too open about his identity?" Her eyes were narrowed and for a brief moment of panic Grissom wondered if he might need to intervene. But her voice lowered rather than raised, which was no less dangerous a sound, but he knew from experience her words would be less explosive. "…That's like saying this was his fault. Like blaming a girl wearing skimpy clothing for being raped. Hell, like blaming a prostitute for being raped. He was not _asking_ for this, and he was not _too open_."

Craig, for his part, had a speculative eyebrow raised and his coffee stalled halfway between the table and his mouth. Nolan's jaw was dropped, and his eyes looked like Sara had just kicked his puppy. Sara, for her part, had a certain look in her eyes—hard, but somewhat regretful. Like she'd realized that, right or not, she might have overreacted. He frowned. She had seemed on edge all morning, actually. No—all night. She had been right that she wouldn't sleep—and having slept during the day himself, he only managed a few hours. Before he fell asleep and after he woke, he could hear her moving around. Not like someone who is merely bored with the stretch of hours they'd been stuck awake, but like someone agitated or uncomfortable.

He had gone so far as to approach the door between their rooms, hesitating to knock and then deciding against it, pressing his ear to the cool wood instead. Her footsteps drew her closer and then further away. Closer and further away. Pacing. She'd been pacing.

Grissom cleared his throat, choosing not to comment, since he could find no way to absolve the young man's unintentional insensitivity without embarrassing Sara for her outburst. "…Cause of death?"

Sara ignored him. "…I'm sorry, Nolan. I overreacted. I'm overtired—jet lag and a different schedule, and—"

"No, no. You were right. I'm sorry. It was an offhand comment and I didn't even _think_ of what I was actually saying, Sa—Miss Sidle. I can't believe I—"

"Sara. You can call me Sara. And, it's fine. Really. I knew you didn't really mean it that way, but I just…"Nolan nodded, like he understood.

There was a long moment of silence, and then Grissom cleared his throat again. Nolan looked at him questioningly. "Cause of death?" He asked, a little irritated, noting that the young man's eyes kept flickering to Sara now, a slight smile lifting his lips.

"Oh! Right. Stab wounds to the chest, same as your vics. Violent, up-close-and-personal, and messy. Also, he was…castrated." All three men winced. "I don't think that detail was included in the newspaper, but Craig said…"

The man in question jumped in. "Sara confirmed when I made the initial call—all three victims were not only castrated, but their penises were removed from the scene. We've had every spare CSI out since we processed, digging through dumpsters. Collin's, at least, is nowhere to be found."

Sara nodded. "Calvin and Vince's too. The killer probably took them with him…" She made a face of strong distaste that Grissom felt reflected his own sentiments exactly. Sara sighed, tucking a strand of hair behind an ear. "Souvenirs, probably. Any other similarities? Boyfriend? Calvin was in a serious relationship, but it doesn't seem like Vince had anyone…"

"Not that his parents or friends knew about." Nolan replied promptly, looking at Sara with nothing short of awe, now.

Grissom cleared his throat. "What kind of evidence did you get off the boy and the scene?"

"Killer didn't cut himself, as far as we could tell, though we were expecting it with a knife attack—we tested just about every inch of blood at the scene. No prints, either, which leads us to believe he was wearing gloves. Thick gloves would solve both of those problems. Otherwise, we had a lot of leads that could mean nothing. Cigarette butts, trash, urine." At Sara's surprised look, he gave her a sad smile, like he too was reflecting on the horrors of humanity. "It was a back alley. No reason to believe it was the killer's, but…"

She nodded, looking away from his gaze and meeting Grissom's instead. "He cut himself with Vince, and we have fingerprints from that scene. Ecklie so generously told that reporter friend of his—you know, the one who is never going to sleep with him—"She flashed a grin to Grissom that made his stomach swoop. "—that we had DNA and fingerprints, so as soon as we had a suspect, we'd be able to confirm and put them away. It sounded macho, even when she quoted him." Sara rolled her eyes.

Craig swallowed the drink of coffee he'd just taken. "So the killer is adapting—he read about himself and changed his ways. Any blood or prints at Calvin's scene?"

"No." Grissom spoke up. "There was nothing really to link the two cases, other than the castration, until now. No fibers, no trace, neither victim was drugged…"

"Oh, we had trace." Nolan spoke up, and Sara and Grissom looked at him in surprise. "Sand, left in a shoe print. At first we were thinking parks, a beach surrounding a lake… but those are typically silica quartz, while this was sandstone. Not atypical, exactly, but it made me think this guy was likely not from the area…"

"Anything else?" Sara asked, her voice controlled but the line of her mouth telling Grissom that she was irritated this information had taken so long to be passed along. Nolan did not notice this.

"Yep. Leather scrapings under his fingernails—he tried to fight back. The killer was probably wearing either leather gloves or a leather jacket. Our trace tech said there's nothing remarkable about the leather, other than the fact that it actually is leather, rather than an imitation. …So the only retailer that rules out is Wal-Mart."

Sara frowned at the attempt to joke and cleared her throat. "Great. Well, why don't Griss and I go take a look at the scene? I think I'd like to get a visual on this, since we don't really have any leads right now."

Craig smiled. "Well, you three have fun. I've got some assignments to distribute and my own case to get to. Nolan, call a black and white to accompany you, alright?"

"Yes, sir." He said, while Sara's eyes sought Grissom's. She had clearly not wanted the young man to accompany them. Craig, yes, but Nolan… "Well, should we get going?" He asked, and Sara's smile and nod were strained.

It was an alleyway, just off campus, behind a liquor store. The people working within had been questions and, of course, had seen nothing. The truth was that they probably hadn't—they were next to a large, noisy street that merged onto the interstate fairly close to the store, and the crime had occurred out back, and not directly behind them. Still, it was frustrating. The security cameras focused only on the doors and therefore the only hint of something amiss occurring was a slight shadow in the security lights indicating someone off-camera moving. Collin Almquist did not appear at all, though that was expected—the directionality of the one footprint they'd matched to him indicated that he had entered from the opposite direction and never passed the liquor store at all.

Sara, for her part, noticed a couple businesses either across from the liquor store or across from the alleyway entrances that might have video, and headed over to speak to them, Nolan looking alarmed that this thought hadn't occurred to him. Grissom didn't particularly feel like praising the man for what he'd forgotten—especially not considering the way he'd been watching Sara—but he also knew that Greg had absolutely bloomed under Sara's careful teaching and positive reinforcement. Much more than he would have had Grissom taken him under his wing and mentored him the way he had Nick and Warrick.

"…It's a long shot, anyway. I don't think any level one would think of that."

Nolan nodded, pursing his lips, and then turned to face Grissom fully, a pleading look on his face. "…It's just that, she's Sara Sidle, you know? She's the voice of the criminalist who doesn't believe their job stops the minute the evidence is collected and processed. The criminalist who doesn't always detach and who cares about their victims and who is… a defender. I mean, I don't think she knows this, but she was a hero to us in grad school. And not only did I make a fool of myself by saying Collin Almquist was "too out"—I mean, god, what was I thinking?—but now I probably neglected the vital piece of evidence that would catch his killer."

Grissom couldn't really think of anything to say to that, really, but he nodded just the same, trying to look consoling. He knew what it felt like to be on the other side of Sara's indignation and, whether he agreed with it or not, he understood what the young man meant. Sara's righteous anger and fervent pursuit of those who would harm others _was _inspiring, misguided though it may also be. At least he now knew why Nolan kept looking at Sara with that dreamy look in his eye—he was looking at his hero. It was reassuring.

"Not to mention… I didn't have any idea she was a woman. It's like having this kind of hero-worship towards a name and you make up an appearance to match. I thought… you know, Sam Sidle or Shawn Sidle or… Stan Sidle. I thought she'd be this middle-aged guy, a genius, but kind of a loner—she seems lonely, in her writing, doesn't she?—and he'd be gruff and a little angry and just this… overwhelming force for good. Misunderstood, but… a real-life hero. And then Craig tells me she's a woman and I'm thinking the same thing, basically—I mean, less hairy, but gruff and severe and…"

Grissom was looking decidedly down at blood spatter on the wall, even though Nolan's analysis of it made perfect sense. He knew exactly what was coming, and he was schooling his features to not react to it while the young man rambled on and on. He wanted to interrupt and tell Nolan he was far too young for her anyway—but Sara was thirty four. Grissom himself was forty nine. And Nolan was likely… twenty eight or twenty nine. Five years, not fifteen.

"…And then she waltzes in, young and beautiful and vivacious and… so full of fire. Not beaten down by job or angry but just… brilliant. I didn't even mind her yelling at me—it was like seeing her words in action. It was… _She_ was… Do you know if she's seeing someone?"


	7. Chapter Five

Disclaimer: I don't own them.

A/N: Sorry this (and Attrition) has/have taken so long. I hope it was worth the wait! Thank you, thank you, all of you, for reading and for your kind words.

And, of course, thank you Pati, my amazing more-than-a-beta.

* * *

Chapter Five:

Sara rubbed her eyes tiredly. She was sitting in the dark of the AV lab, having jumped in to help go through the surveillance video they'd collected. The AV tech was processing them first, of course, cleaning them up for clarity, but she wasn't going to wait for him to get around to watching them. Grissom was with Nolan down in the morgue, having a look at the body. He'd implied that it was just to get a feel for the case and the victims, but Sara knew that Grissom was bothered that the young CSI hadn't collected the surveillance tapes from surrounding businesses and traffic cams. He'd probably wanted to make sure Nolan hadn't missed anything else.

And, maybe, that the coroner hadn't either. Sara wasn't sure if Grissom felt this way, exactly, but the longer Sara was there, the more she doubted this lab's competency.

…Though, it was quite possible that this was simply her reaction to Nolan. She had been rather flattered, at first, when he'd seemed so impressed with her and her papers. She was used to people fawning over Grissom that way, but never her. Oh, sure, she knew that her papers were always well-received, because journals readily accepted them and she got the occasional letter from someone in the field, commending her, and because people reference her articles in their own, and always with a tone of respect. So she did not believe that she was a nobody in the forensics world, but…

The way he'd looked at her had been above and beyond professional admiration. It was the way she used to look at Grissom, when he'd been more icon than man. And it had quickly gone from gratifying to annoying, to downright alarming. She now understood why Grissom had seemed so surprised and discomfited that she repeated his own words back to him as if they were law. Nolan had, on the drive from the scene back to the lab, attempted to start a conversation with her about the hit and run case, in which the killer had allowed his victim to bleed out through his windshield rather than bring him to the hospital and sacrifice his own future. It was one that still haunted her, because it flaunted human evil—the ability to not only be cruel and selfish in a violent, uncontrollable moment, but over the span of days. It was not as bad as some things she knew others had seen, and really, not as bad as the things she had seen herself… and yet, it had stuck with her.

It was when he'd quoted a statement she'd made about never underestimating the capacity for human selfishness that she went from indulgently discussing the case and the article to feeling uncertain. This was a bit beyond.

So when she and Grissom had decided on their courses of action and Nolan had suggested that he help her in the AV lab, her eyes had beseeched Grissom to help her out, and his smile told her that he understood. He may have even been happy to help—maybe he'd had his own creepy fans himself.

…She hadn't come off that way to him, had she?

Regardless, her eyes were watering from staring at the screens, and she was beginning to wonder what was taking them so long to return—she could almost see how Grissom would communicate in cryptic little one-word answers and minute facial expressions, knowing Sara would understand and Nolan would not, and how Nolan would continue his oh-so-annoying hero worshipping, unaware of the exchange he was being left out of.

She would never criticize another star who complained about fans, paparazzi, and privacy. Ever again. She rubbed her eyes once more, allowing herself the luxury of a long, extended stretch.

"What's that?"

Sara jumped and yelped, spinning around to see the speaker's smirk, his young counterpart beside him.

"Oh! You scared me! …What's what?"

"_That._" Grissom replied, pointing to the paused screen, his large finger pointing directly at an obscure shadow in one corner. Sara frowned, blinking away the moisture that had collected, mid-yawn, in the corners of her tired eyes, and leaned in closer.

"…I can't tell. But it's something. It wasn't there a second ago." Sara made a note of the time on the video, and then clicked 'play', watching the shadow move a little more into sight, clearing into a human form. It slid along one side of the alley and moved out of sight, further than the camera had been able to pick up.

"...Coming from the wrong side of the alley to be Collin. What's the time on the video?" Grissom asked. Sara looked down.

"12:43 a.m."

"Falls within our TOD." Nolan threw out, though of course everyone there knew that. There was a brief moment of silence as they each processed the information. Once again, Grissom was the first to speak.

"We know where he goes from here. He passes the liquor store, which is why he's hugging the wall; he's knows there's a camera. And then he encounters Collin. Which means our killer more than likely knew he was coming."

"That means he probably knew Collin. Or watched him—he knew which way Collin would walk. …Where is this guy coming from? He appears almost out of nowhere. The video covers enough of the entrance to the alley that you'd think we'd see him coming…" Sara frowned and rewound the video, prior to the point where Grissom had noted the shadow, and played it again.

Once again, the figure seemed to come from one of the brick walls on either side of the alley. Grissom "mmm"-ed and clucked his tongue. "There's got to be a doorway there. It must open in rather than out. Nolan, is that included in the crime scene sketch? We're too far down for that to be the liquor store…"

"I, uh… I'm not sure. I'll… I'll go see what we've got." He turned and left the room, his pace hurried, and Grissom smiled and sat down next to Sara.

"Getting tired? You know, the day shift is about done—why don't we let Nolan follow up this lead and head back to the hotel? Grab some supper?"

Sara looked up at him, unable to read his features in the dim light of the screen they'd been watching. "…You want to stop when we have this lead to run with?"

He shifted enough for her to see a soft smile on his features. "The building immediately beside the liquor store was abandoned—it's a lead, but not huge… Nolan will get the name, follow up on who owns it, and a detective will speak with the owner, who will likely swear ignorance. And in that neighborhood, they could be entirely truthful; it would not be hard to get into that building, undetected, to wait for Collin. Right now, we don't have much… and you're exhausted."

Sara frowned, wanting to argue—if not because they had a lead to follow, then simply for habit's sake—but she _was_ tired. And achy. The truth was that food—she hadn't eaten since this morning—and a long, hot shower would do her a world of good. "…Yeah, okay."

Nolan stepped through the door, case file in hand. "Building next door is a closed-down hardware store that's been out of business for at least a decade. I've got our detective looking for the current owner, so for now at least, we've gone as far as we can go."

Sara frowned at his willingness to let it go at that, but nodded, rubbing her head. She felt like she was experiencing every menstrual symptom possible and couldn't feasibly argue with Nolan without yelling at him again. "Great. Great. …Shift is pretty much over now, isn't it?"

"Yeah, it is. Listen, I was thinking maybe, uh… I could take you out for a meal tonight. You know, you don't know the city and…"

Sara, tired and uncomfortable, misinterpreted his proposal, and turned to Grissom, hoping he would have the mental capacity to turn Nolan down for the both of them. "…Grissom? What do you think?"

Grissom blinked in surprise, taking a moment to realize that Sara had assumed Nolan was inviting the pair of them, and then deliberately went along with her misunderstanding. "…I think that sounds fine. Maybe a shower first. Sara?"

She narrowed her eyes, wondering what had prompted her anti-social boss to accept the invitation, but nodded, grateful for the shower suggestion nonetheless. She did not notice Nolan's look of surprise at how this had turned, nor the frown he rushed to disguise. So they headed back to the conference room, which Craig had set aside for them, and retrieved their coats and Sara her purse. They had been given a lab vehicle to use during their stay, and Nolan rode with them rather than taking his own vehicle, much to both Sara and Grissom's silent irritation.

He said he'd wait in the lobby, to give them some privacy, and the pair rode up in the elevator together. Grissom glanced at her as soon as the doors closed, noting the crease in her forehead that hinted at discomfort, if not pain. "…You okay?"

She looked at him and nodded, a little heat rising in her face. "No, I'm fine."

"…You've seemed a little off all day. Aren't you feeling well?"

Sara wasn't sure what to do with a concerned Grissom, especially when he appeared when she was not either bleeding or sobbing. The elevator doors opened before she could pick her jaw up off the floor and respond. Instead, they stepped out and separated into their rooms without her managing to give an answer. After her door closed, Sara took a moment to frown in confusion, wondering when she had become the one who couldn't vocalize her thoughts. She eyed the wall now between them, uncertain, before stripping out of her clothes and slipping into the bathroom.

Even if she didn't know how to read Grissom—or herself—right now, a hot shower would be magical.

She apparently took too long—she had only just stepped out of the bathroom when a knock came on the door separating her room from Grissom's. Frantically grabbing two of the small hotel towels and cringing at the thought of what could be on them, she hurried out of the bathroom. Another knock came, this one impatient, and knowing that Grissom was a rather patient person, she could only assume she hadn't heard the first several. With a huff, she wrapped the tiny towel around herself and moved to the door, opening it a crack and leaning around so that her body was blocked by the door and only her wet hair and face were visible.

"Hi. I just got out. Sorry I took so long. I'll just be a second."

"No, I…" Red had risen in his cheeks, behind the beard and just above it, along his cheek bones. "You haven't… taken a long time. I…" He cleared his throat and lifted his hand, offering her a bottle of Advil.

"…Oh." She blushed, opening the door just a little wider so that she could look at him with her head upright. "Thank you. …How…?"

He shook his head. "You've been rubbing your head all day. I just thought…"Sara felt tears slipping into her eyes and cursed her hormones, which were presently riding a fucking rollercoaster, and had dragged her emotions along for the ride. Grissom looked positively alarmed at this development and blinked several times in confusion. "I, uh… Are you okay, honey?"

"No. I mean, yes. I'm… I'm fine." She extended a bare arm around the door, single drops of water still clinging to it here and there, and took the Advil from him. "Thanks, Griss."

He nodded, his eyes wide, and she closed the door between them, because it was the primary thing keeping her from catapulting around the door and into his surprisingly-considerate-and-attentive arms. And as he'd been pretty clear in the past about where they stood, she doubted he would appreciate her falling into his embrace in only a towel. The little bottle in her hands—and the fact he had realized she needed it without being told—was as precious a gift as she'd ever received.

After taking three of the magical painkillers, Sara decided that she was not going to try harder than she had to. She slipped into her favorite ripped jeans that she'd worn on the plane ride here and found a soft tank top and an even softer long-sleeved shirt, luxuriating in the comfort the textures provided. She brushed her hair but, after a moment of hesitation, decided not to blow dry it. Grissom had seen her after showers more times than she could count, and Nolan already thought she was flawless—she could handle his illusions being shattered a little. A glance at her complexion told her she'd be fine without makeup, and then she was tapping on Grissom's door.

He opened it and she offered him a tentative smile. "…Ready?" He raised an eyebrow in question and she shrugged, relieved when he accepted her silent avoidance with a nod and a head tilt towards his door. She stepped through, into his room, amazed that it already smelled like him, and followed him to the door, slipping into her coat as she did.

And noting that he had a microwave. She did not. She frowned, but stepped out the door he held open for her and walked near his side back to the elevators, wishing Grissom had just told their over-attentive tag-along that they were too tired to eat out. They could have ordered room service and went over the case in one of their rooms, and she could have spent the night in sweat pants. With Grissom.

It would almost be like a happily ever after—one of her favorite fantasies was curling up on her couch with Grissom behind her, both in sweats, her cold feet tucked under his warm calves and his arms around her.

Not that she expected the cuddling and the warming—but the time together, well… that alone would be closer than she'd ever gotten. She glanced sideways at him just before the doors opened again to the lobby, and noted his increasing frown and sympathized—she was dreading reuniting with Nolan too. With a frown of her own at the lingering cramps that hadn't yet been numbed, she vowed that they would end their night as early as possible and that she wouldn't chicken out, once they returned to the hotel. She could ask him to walk through the case with her, or watch a movie or… just mindlessly watch anything.

The doors open, and the young man bounded over to them, and Sara wondered if she'd taken enough Advil to combat the headache they'd be eating with.


	8. Chapter Six

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: Hope you guys enjoy! Sorry, again, for the delay. Hopefully, once school starts... :) Anyway, let me know what you think! An interlude chapter is next!

Thanks, as always, to Pati, my more-than-a-beta.

* * *

Chapter Six:

Sara blinked heavily, trying desperately to stay awake and keep her eyes on the young man before her, who was _still_ talking about the cannibal cheerleader article. And never before had she imagined that someone could discuss it without making her feel sick to her stomach, yet here she was, bored out of her mind by it. One can only have their stomach turned so often—while eating, she might add—before you just decide that you're tired and hungry and the Advil has only just started to work, and you're going to eat whether he wants to discuss children eating each other or not.

…Although, it did not help that he was eating a rather rare steak while speaking.

Grissom had initially looked rather disturbed at the dinner conversation himself, though his expression had now dimmed into a slightly amused smile. In a flare of bitterness, Sara speculated that this was likely because he remembered sending her out alone on that case, after pulling her home from a vineyard on her day off. God, she hated wine.

"More wine for you folks?" The helpful waiter interrupted politely, cutting Nolan out of his practical recitation of the damn paper. Sara sat up eagerly.

"Absolutely." She held up her glass and straightened herself, using the time she spent watching the burgundy liquid pour into her glass to come up with an alternate conversation topic. If drinking another awful glass of the stuff would keep her from enduring another second of Nolan's praise, she would gladly accept that price.

What was it about Minnesotan men suggesting wine with every meal, anyway? First Craig, now Nolan… you'd think they were in wine country instead of… cow country? What exactly was this godforsaken wasteland known for, anyway, other than giant statues of mythical lumberjacks?

"Lakes." She unintentionally answered her own question aloud.

Grissom quirked an eyebrow and Nolan looked confused, and Sara was grateful she could blame the drink for the slight pink in her cheeks. "Oh! I, ah… Are there really ten thousand of them?" Oh, yeah, she thought, great job Sidle. Master conversationalist if there ever was one.

"Oh, there's way more than that." Nolan replied. "I doubt anyone really knows how many. You see, glaciers—"

"Actually," Grissom interrupted, and Sara felt herself awaken, just a little. "It depends on your definition of a 'lake', but the official count of lakes in Minnesota measuring an acre or larger is just shy of 11,850. Smaller than that and you get into ambiguous terms: When does a lake become a pond become a puddle, etcetera."

Sara was grinning now, mostly at the bewildered and slightly grudging look on Nolan's face, but also in part at the smug expression on her favorite entomologist's. They might as well be honest and just compare penis sizes right here at the table. She pursed her lips, fighting back a smile, and scooped a bite of pasta into her mouth.

Nolan surveyed the pair of them for a long moment, and then fixed his gaze on Grissom. "So Craig was telling me, Dr. Grissom, that you worked here when you were a rookie CSI. He said you were quite the ladies' man."

Sara felt herself pale, and turned to look at Grissom almost accusingly, though she knew she had no right to be angry about this information. She had been what, eleven or twelve? Grissom, for his part, looked extremely uncomfortable, and avoided her eyes. Instead, he met Nolan's gaze head on, with a small smile. "I think that term would be quite an exaggeration, though I'm flattered by it. I do wish that my legacy here dealt more with the cases I solved, but—"

"Were you the one who lost a body?" Nolan questioned, and Sara narrowed her eyes. What exactly was Nolan doing here? She might be half asleep, but that didn't mean she was blind. Nolan was baiting Grissom, and it irked her, even if she couldn't quite process the whys behind it.

"Yeah. Yes. I…"He glanced at Sara, looking a little sheepish, and continued with an air about him of speaking against his will. "Well, really, the problem was with the Coroner's office—"

"He's also the one who helped me nail the bastard who let his victim bleed out in his car, which you've been busy talking about all night. He's a world-renowned forensic scientist whose expertise is sought out everywhere, and you're a kid who just graduated and who likely owes his job to the fact that this lab is understaffed and underfunded. He's a criminalist, and you're a CSI level one; there's a big difference. So if we're done playing this strange, convoluted game of one-upmanship, I think I'd like to go back to the hotel and go to bed."

She fumbled in her purse, pulled out a fifty, and handed it to Grissom. "If you'll take care of the check, I'll pull the car around."

It was cold outside, and more than once she almost slipped on ice in the parking lot. She briefly wished that she'd let one of the others come sit in the cold car while it warmed up and she waited to pay, but the idea of sitting alone with either of them right now…

Yeah, no, she'd made the right choice.

Grissom took the passenger seat, Nolan clambered into the back, and the ride was executed in near silence. Near, because Grissom would softly intone directions to her like, "You wanna be in the far right lane," and "This is your exit." Sara expected Nolan to attempt to apologize or give excuses for his behavior, but he sat sullenly in the back like a scolded child. A little calmer now, she genuinely thought that maybe she'd gone too far—nothing she'd said had been all that untrue, but it was not normally something she would give voice to. He was just a kid, but given some direction and guidance, he really could be a great CSI. …So long as he stopped trying to embarrass and outdo people instrumental in the success of the field.

When she pulled up to the lab, so Nolan could get his car, she let him get completely out of the car before her guilt overwhelmed her. "Nolan!" She opened her window and though she could feel Grissom frowning behind her, she waited patiently for the young man to make his way back to her. "I… I'm sorry if I overreacted tonight. I'm not… myself, right now. You're a good CSI, and the world needs people who care as much as you do."

It wasn't until that moment that Sara fully understood what had been taking place tonight. Because Nolan looked at her like he was thinking about kissing her. His eyes flickered to her lips and he shifted his weight on his feet and his expression told her that he wanted to lean through the window she was peering out of and taste her. With a smile that she hoped was sincere but didn't reveal how much she knew of his intentions, she backed her head out of the range of fire, so that he would have to completely lunge into the vehicle to kiss her if he were going to try. "Well, Goodnight, Nolan."

He nodded too, looking sullen and disappointed. "Goodnight, Sara."

She waited for him to turn and make it to his car before she drove out of the parking lot, following Grissom's directions of, "Left at the lights." She didn't expect Grissom to speak more than that on the drive back, and so she gave herself a moment to analyze the shift reality had taken when she'd realized that Nolan was attracted to her. He had said, tonight, when asking them to grab food, "you" rather than "you guys". At the time she had blown it off, thinking it was maybe a weird pattern of speech she was unfamiliar with—she had been too tired to question it. But now it seemed likely that he'd just been asking her, and Grissom had… also misunderstood, or gone along with it?

She frowned and turned onto the exit Grissom indicated, realizing that his participation in that behavior tonight, though to a lesser extent than Nolan, implied that he had absolutely known what was going on. He had come along to prevent any kind of date-like atmosphere, because he was still unwilling to let anyone else have her, even when he didn't really want her himself. That, too, irked her. Maybe more than Nolan's actions, actually, because at least his had been fairly upfront and honest. Grissom's were underhanded and manipulative, and just a little dishonest.

She took the exit for their hotel without being prompted and in a moment of irritation, pulled up to the front. "You go ahead. I'll find a place to park."

He looked surprised, and shook his head. "It's late, Sara. Do you really think you should be walking alone in a city you don't know? At night?"

She rolled her eyes. "I do it in Vegas and the crime rate is probably triple the rate here. I'm fine."

He frowned, but acquiesced and got out of the vehicle, moving into the lobby while Sara searched for a parking spot and then made her own way inside. It had been long enough for him to have spent some time at the front desk requesting extra pillows and a wake up call, scan the lobby for a paper, and then go up the elevator and into his room, and yet he was still sitting in one of the lobby chairs, sans paper, waiting. She scowled, but he smiled and stood.

"You didn't have to wait for me, Grissom."

His smile twitched and he nodded. "I suspect you didn't want me to."

"Gee, what are you, a CSI?" she mumbled irritably, stabbing the elevator button. It opened immediately and they stepped inside.

"Someone tonight told me I was a criminalist—and that there's a big difference." There was laughter in his voice, though he spoke absolutely seriously, and Sara wasn't sure if she wanted to laugh at him or cry. After a moment, she settled for a strained chuckle.

"Man, I'm kind of a crazy person tonight, huh?"

At this he did chuckle and Sara frowned wondering what exactly had put him in such a good mood. "Nah, he deserved it. Then again, I did too, but I appreciated the favoritism." He sent her a sly grin, and she felt her whole face getting hot. Grissom had picked up the double entendres in the last year and could be a major flirt if you understood the references he was making, but he wasn't usually so… expressive. It was sneaky comments about what Victoria's Secret was or using a Victorian novel to tell her he needed a screw. Ahem. But this open teasing…

"Were you really a ladies' man, here?"

The elevator opened, and his mouth was still moving like a fish's, uncertain. She sighed and stepped out, waiting for him to fall into step with her before she looked up at him questioningly. He had his jaw set and his eyes were scanning the hallway like it was a crime scene, likely looking for a way out. They stopped in front of their doors, but she made no move to open his door and give him an escape. Finally, he sighed.

"Craig's perception might be a little skewed, for personal reasons. I don't believe that's an adequate representation of who I was, nor how I behaved with women, while I lived here."

Sara nodded, biting her bottom lip, and then turned to her door, willing to leave it at that. Grissom turned to his door as well, and then stopped. "…Sara—"

She turned to look at him, waiting for what he would say…and he did his open-mouthed expression again, as if bewildered that he'd spoken at all, much less when she'd been about to let him walk away from this suddenly awkward conversation. Sara sighed, suddenly just so beyond tired that she didn't feel like she could possibly stand up for another moment, much less stand here waiting for him to decide if he was going to speak or not. Once again, she gave him the out.

"…Okay. It's okay, Grissom. I'll see you tomorrow morning."

She slipped into her room and sighed in relief when the door closed behind her. Kicking off shoes and sliding her jeans to the floor as she walked, she slumped onto the bed and curled her legs to her chest. She was too tired to even consider the fact that most hotels didn't wash the top comforter, just the sheets beneath it. And anyway, she wasn't going to sleep. She just needed to lie still for a moment, before she got up to change into pajamas and brush her teeth and brush out her windswept hair. She wasn't going to sleep. She just needed to close her eyes, just for a second, because it had been such a long, long day.

She didn't hear the light tapping on the door between her room and Grissom's a few minutes later, in part because it was so light, and in part because she was busy not-sleeping. Really. She was just resting her eyes.


	9. Interlude Two

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: Thanks to Pati, as always. Sorry for the delay, guys. Hopefully I'll be back on track soon. And thanks for all the well-wishes. They meant a lot.

Enjoy!

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Interlude Two:

By the time she returned to the room, blankets, sheets, and even a few threadbare towels in tow, the fire was dwindling. Sara gritted her teeth and moved to add more chair pieces and several more pages of the maintenance guide before turning to look at Grissom. He had lain down under the blankets which, in this room, were in decent shape. Not great, but enough to make her think they just might be okay.

She piled the race car blankets onto the dresser and climbed up on it a second later. She winced but did her best to ignore the pain in her tailbone from the rat-induced fall she'd had in the storage room. …Stupid rat. If this wasn't such a dire situation, she might tell Grissom about her heroics, just to hear him laugh, but right now…

The blankets were large enough to each hang down from the curtain rod and over one window, covering it completely. There would still be a draft along the edges, but unless she could find tape or thumb tacks, it was probably the best she could do. After a moment of thought, she retrieved two of the heavier books she had dragged in here for kindling and set them on the dresser, on either side of the windows and all the way against the wall, to at least hold the blankets down a little.

Feeling reasonably pleased with herself, she moved over to check on Grissom and felt his face—he felt hot, but that might be because her own fingers were freezing. He was still wearing her gloves. He lifted his eyes to her in wry tolerance of her worry, which did seem like him, if not a little more tolerant than normal… Still, she went over symptoms of hypothermia in her head—dizziness, clumsiness, confusion, poor decision making, apathy, slurred speech, tiredness—and felt a rush of relief when she realized she hadn't seen any of those. I mean, he was lying down, but he wasn't asleep… yet.

With an aggravated eye roll and the overwhelming urge to give the finger to the god she didn't believe in for letting them go out in a fucking blizzard, she moved out into the cabin again, clutching the empty bag that had held the winter survival supplies. She was pretty sure that the room would heat up well as long as they stopped opening the door, kept the fire going, and conserved body heat… so she needed everything to be in the room.

She spent several minutes digging through the kitchen and retrieving pots and pans—the largest of which she took with her to the door of the cabin and filled with snow, first by using it to scoop, and then topping it off by using her bare hands. The cold burned, but she packed in as much as she could and then slammed the door closed behind her. She had enough books to serve as kindling for several hours at least, so as long as she had enough wood…

Her next task was breaking up the remaining three chairs. Her hands stung all over again with each slam against the floor, worse this time because they were already burning from the snow, but now she had a better idea of how much force was needed, and it only took her a few times with each chair to have it reduced to firewood-sized pieces. She put the wood into the bag first, filling it entirely and still having plenty left over. She gathered the pan of snow and a couple of its empty counterparts on top of the bag and carried it all back into the room. She put the pot close to the fire to start melting into water for them—eventually she'd have to make sure it boiled so they could drink it—and unloaded and stacked the chair pieces beside the fire, adding a couple pieces to the fire for good measure.

A glance at Grissom told her he was still awake, and she moved over to him. "Hey, how are you feeling? Are you warm yet?"

He nodded, looking sheepish, but Sara shook her head sternly. "No, you have to speak, Griss—What's my name?"

"Sara." At her raised eyebrow, he quirked a smile. "Sidle."

She nodded and stood. "I'm gonna haul the rest of the chairs in here for wood, as well as the canned food, and maybe try to stick one of the old towels out the front door so that they'll see us if they come looking. I'm sure the lab vehicle will be buried in snow pretty soon… How long do you think they'll be?"

His blue eyes looked up at her and she saw… something. Hesitation, maybe, or was it confusion? That was a symptom. "Soon. A few hours, maybe. I'm sure they're on their way."

Sara nodded despite her uncertainty, moving to pick up the now empty bag and a large blue towel that was raggedy but would serve her purpose. She moved out of the room again, first moving to the front door and wedging a corner of the towel in by the hinges before closing it, hoping it would stay put rather than go flying in the wind. She waited a long moment and, not seeing it come loose at all, nodded resolutely and moved to pile the rest of the broken splinters of chair into the empty bag. She filled it up entirely again, with wood to spare, but she was determined to make it in one trip. She took the canned food she could find: baked beans and green beans and lots of Cream of Mushroom soup—she wrinkled her nose in distaste at that one—and piled the cans on top of the wood in the bag.

Reasonably certain she could manage it without dropping the cans, she scooped up the remaining wood in one arm, holding it against her chest, and then lifted the bag with her free hand. She had to walk slowly, but she did make it without dropping anything. Once inside the room again, she sighed in relief and set down her load. She closed the door tightly behind her and grabbed the other towels—mostly hand towels—and stuffed them under the door to prevent any drafts.

Another glance at Grissom brought all her worry back to her. "Griss?"

"Mmm?"

"What day of the week is it?"

"Friday."

Sara nodded, chewing on the inside of her cheek and beginning to pile the wood she'd just brought onto the pile she'd started. The cans lined up on the floor along the edge of the hearth, out of the heat. As she worked, she asked him other, more complex things, testing his cognitive abilities.

"Six plus twelve plus three?"

"Twenty-One."

"He killed his father and married his mother… and then gouged his own eyes out?"

"Oedipus."

"He kills his wife when he discovers another man has her strawberry handkerchief?"

"Othello."

"The secret to your Red Creeper recipe?"

"Sara, I'm at risk for hypothermia—that doesn't make me stupid."

She grinned, and finally left him in silence, reasonably assured that he was going to be fine as long as they kept warm. She finished with the wood and scooted the pan of slowly melting snow closer to the fire and then stood, ready to get out of her soaking wet shoes and the pants that were now also wet to the knees from her attempts at gathering the snow. Still on the bed were the long underwear and thick socks, so she sat on the end and kicked off her shoes, thinking that her toes were the coldest at this point.

Other than her hands. She flexed her fingers and winced—they were so numb they hurt… if that made any sense. "…I'm sorry Sara."…_That_ didn't make sense.

She turned slightly and glanced at him—he hadn't moved. She frowned and peeled her wet socks off, just to keep focused on something. "What are you sorry for?"

She could hear him swallow as she pulled on the thick socks—first one pair, then another—and stood up, wondering whether she ought to move into another room to change… but he was sitting still, staring at the fire, and she was out of his line of sight. She slipped out of her coat, picked up the long underwear shirt, and quickly slid out of her shirt, thankful she'd had the foresight to wear a tank top beneath it.

"…For dragging you out here when I should have known better, for letting you do all the work, for acting like… such an ass tonight." There was a brief pause as Sara stood there, the long underwear top over her head and arms but not yet pulled down. She couldn't seem to make herself move, at first, until she realized how cold her stomach was getting. She tugged it down and reached for the pants. "And for… making you miss your Christmas plans. I should have… made you stay in Vegas or… sent you home days ago, as planned. I didn't want… You shouldn't be here, with me, right now."

She licked her lips, her head swimming with this information and with her surprise that Grissom had said… so much. So much about his feelings. She frowned and slid her jeans down her legs and stepped into the long-underwear pants, relishing how warm and dry they were, even if they were rather large on her. She pulled her coat back around her and moved to the open side of the bed, furthest from the fire, between Grissom and the window.

"It's okay, Griss." She told his back. "I basically made you bring me along and I wouldn't have let you send me home if you tried. I… I mean, I wish I weren't here right now, spending…" She glanced at her watch, barely illuminated in the flickering fire light, and saw that it was just past midnight. It was officially Christmas Eve. "…spending Christmas in a freezing cabin with no electricity and canned pork and beans as my best source of nutrition… but I'd also never forgive myself if you were here, alone. This is more important."

He didn't immediately respond to that, so she sighed, eyeing the fire that was now burning merrily and feeling reasonably satisfied that she didn't need to do anything else, at least for a while. Then, she turned her eyes to the empty space beside him.

She hesitated, not wanting to just slip into bed with him, but she was cold, especially now that she had her shoes off. It was another one of those moments where it should have been the most intimate of actions between them, and yet it wasn't. She sighed and slid under the covers, already slightly warm from his body heat. That alone was reassuring—she was pretty sure people didn't get fevers with hypothermia, so as long as he was warm, he was okay.

He rolled over to face her and her heart sped up despite her efforts to keep it in check. "Thank you. …You probably saved my life, tonight."

She gave a watery smile, wishing so very much that she could close the gap between them and press her cold lips to his warm ones. But his actions tonight—even if he'd apologized—they told her that despite his moments of kindness and… openness… the past week or so, he still wasn't interested in a relationship with her. And she knew that—he might challenge Nolan for flirting with her, but that was him wanting to have his cake and eat it too. It wasn't going anywhere.

Still, it was one of those surreal moments that she'd dreamed about so many times, and now that it was here, she didn't know what to do about it. Alone in a bed with Grissom. God, this was the stuff of trashy romance novels—the next thing she knew he'd be suggesting they cuddle close for warmth and pointing out that sex would dramatically raise their body temperatures…

"You probably saved mine too. Griss, I… I'm sorry. You don't have to apologize for that stuff with Nolan because… I think I realized what I was doing. I… I wanted it to bother you. I just didn't expect it to turn out… the way it did."

His eyes were locked on hers, but after a moment they drifted to her lips and her heart started up again. Was this a fantasy come true for him as well? Her eyelids were fluttering closed and she was ready to feel him tug her to him and devour her mouth with his when the most unexpected thing interrupted her daydream.

…He was still talking, for some reason. Not kissing her, not watching her lips and wanting to kiss her, and certainly not tugging her to him in his desperate need. No. Just talking. She let her breath out in a huff and paid attention again in time to catch the end of his sentence.

"…you going to be spending Christmas with?" She blinked in surprise, and realized that she had a missed a 'Who were' and probably a lot more than that. With disappointment seeping into her as deep as the chill coming from the windows she had attempted to cover, she sighed and shook her head.

"It isn't important, Griss. Let's try to get some sleep." Resolutely, she turned her back to him and closed her eyes, tucking her still freezing hands under her arms in an attempt to warm them. If she stopped thinking about how close he was, this entire situation would be easier to bear.


	10. Chapter Seven

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: ...Did somebody ask for a trifecta? csiKathy, I don't know if you realized this, but those words were like a challenge, which I think I have risen to (barely). :) Hahaha!

Sadly, this was un-beta-ed as I did just finish it last minute, and I was posting to meet a challenge and all... but Pati, my beta and friend, helped with it whether she proof-read it or not. Also, if there are any strange lines, that's my fault. I make weird typos without her...

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this! I will likely spend the next just-over-an-hour pacing, and then the hour after that screaming so... :)

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Chapter Seven:

"We had to've missed something."

She could feel Grissom's gaze on her, but she kept her on the file in front of her. She didn't know what, exactly, they'd missed, but she could feel it. A prickly sensation, like being watched.

Her plate pushed against the manila folder she had laid out before her and she glanced up, finally, at the man who was nudging it forward. "You need to eat—that'll still be here in twenty minutes."

She aimed a glare at him, but he merely smiled and took a bite of his peanut butter toast, like it was normal for them to argue case files over breakfast. She reluctantly closed the folder and set it aside, taking a drink of her apple juice and thinking over the details again, without the visual cues.

The evidence they'd found in Vegas was enough to prove who the killer was or wasn't, once they had a viable suspect, but nothing else they'd found at any of the three crime scenes was leading them to anyone. Nolan had called this morning to tell them that their detective had looked into it and given him a call—he planned to speak to the owner of the abandoned hardware store at nine a.m. and in the meantime, he was attempting to get a warrant from a judge based on the video feed evidence. If the guy gave them permission, they'd be processing the store at 9:05. If not… maybe more like 9:45.

But if he'd been as careful in the building as he had been out of it, stabbing Collin, they weren't likely to find anything remotely probative. Which meant that to find the killer, they needed to understand his M.O. He was someone who—

"Sara. Do you think I don't know you well enough to know you haven't stopped? Eat." Grissom directed.

She flashed him a distracted smile and poured milk into the little Styrofoam bowl—Really? Styrofoam? It was so bad for the environment and it wasn't like they were staying at a cheap hotel and you could expect that they could at least provide real dishes for their guests—and took a bite of her cereal for good measure.

Then, she continued as if uninterrupted.

He was someone either hung out in or watched gay bars and someone who attended or paid attention to or was involved in University drag shows. Assuming he didn't know the boys, and taking into account that he'd made an effort to make the crimes similar, chances were they weren't run of the mill hate crimes but something more perso—

She paused in her beginnings of a psychological profile when something occurred to her. "Did they get a list of people who attended the drag show? Does the University have a list? What about people involved in the production? There's no real way to keep track of the comings and goings in bars but at a show…"

She started going through the file frantically, and Grissom dropped his toast to his plate and grabbed half of the papers held within, shuffling through them with just as much concern. "They couldn't have missed something so obvious. Surely their detective—"

"Well, it's not in here. So either they didn't do it or Nolan failed to include it in this file. We have to go." She glanced at her watch. "If we leave now, we can call Nolan on the way and maybe catch our detective before he meets with the Hardware Store owner."

Grissom, no longer arguing with her, passed her half the file to reassemble and scrambled into his coat. "I'll go start the car. Meet me out there?"

"Absolutely." She nodded, sorting the various evidence back into the file at lightning speed.

The drive to the Hennepin County Crime Lab had taken roughly fifteen minutes every other time they'd made the drive from their hotel. Today, they made it in seven and a half. The entire time of which, Sara spent trying to get ahold of Nolan. Despite being entirely aware that he could have been in the shower for the full eight minutes she called him before she hung up and stormed into the lab, she was angry. Either they'd forgotten something that should have been… elementary… or Nolan hadn't included it in the copy of the case file he'd provided, which was just foolish. Ask someone to help with the investigation and leave out a major piece of—

"Woah, Gil, Sara. You're in early." Craig was clearly on his way to his office from the break room, a cup of coffee in one hand, a doughnut resting on top of the manila folder he held in the other, a copy of today's Star Tribune tucked under his arm.

"Nolan in?" Sara demanded, while Grissom said, "Do we have the clearance to access the evidence vault?"

He blinked a little uncertainly, and then nodded. "Yes. I mean, no. I mean, Nolan isn't in yet, but yes you have clearance. What's up, Gil?"

"Just… checking our bases. I'll come find you whether it works out or not." And then he had his hand tucked between Sara's side and her arm, grasping just above the elbow, tugging her into an area of the lab she hadn't yet been privy to.

They flashed their temporary badges and the man at the desk called in to double check their clearance, just in case, before allowing them access to the case's evidence. Although Sara was momentarily surprised that the man had been so careful—when everyone else at this lab seemed sub-par—she was quickly delivered back to the status quo when he waved them past him and raised his own copy of the newspaper up in front of his face. In Vegas, they were allowed to retrieve their own evidence, but generally speaking this was a courtesy rather than a right. She'd worked there at least a year before she'd been given a nod and a head jerk, indicating that she was allowed beyond the threshold, and even then she'd been watched warily.

This man was entirely unconcerned.

Still, this might be one of the things this lab had on Vegas. It was a massive evidence vault. That combined with the lower volume of crimes meant that they weren't constantly shuffling for space—as evidenced by the dates on the sealed boxes. They could keep cases that had gone cold on-hand for longer… there was no constant demand to prioritize which evidence was most needed at any given time.

She had gotten distracted. Grissom was already returning to her with a stack of two boxes, both sealed, and a meaningful look. She nodded, and together they signed it out and returned to a layout room. Each taking a box and working in tandem, they cut the tape and began sorting. Sara had Collin's clothing, personal effects, autopsy report… Grissom's held molds of the two shoe prints they'd found—one Collin's and one unknown—the trace sand that Nolan had mentioned, the surveillance video they'd collected, and a large file—presumably containing all that Nolan had copied for them.

With slight irritating, Sara passed the autopsy report to Grissom and made a note on the logs of both boxes, documenting the transfer. This disorganization and the lack of professionalism here was frustrating her and she wondered if the lab had been this way when Grissom worked here, or if the infamous Philip Gerard had run a tighter ship. …Probably the latter. He'd been a real hard ass.

"Nothing. Either the University didn't have any kind of list at all, or it didn't occur to them." Sara looked up at Grissom, who'd already shuffled through the file and clearly come up empty. She sighed, and then pulled out her phone, dialing 411 rather than taking the time to look up the number she was seeking. After jumping through a few hoops, she was connected to the Theatre Department and tapped her nails anxiously on the lighted tables, exactly like the ones in Vegas. Clearly they hadn't been custom-made. Which meant you could order them. She'd have to remember to tell Doc Robb—

"University of Minnesota Theatre Department." She cleared her throat, her gloved fingers fanning out on the table instead.

"Hi, this is Sara Sidle working in conjunction with the Hennepin County Crime Lab. We're investigating a murder that took place just off campus, five days ago—the night of a drag show I believe you put on."

"Oh, my goodness. What can I do to help?"

"We were looking for information on who many have attended the show as well as anyone involved in the production."

"One moment please."

Sara was put on hold and finally met Grissom's eyes. They held a question and she sighed. "I'm on hold. There's no way to know if they've had this request before or—"

"Ma'am?"

"Yes?" Sara answered, cutting off her sentence and her eye contact to continue her conversation.

"I've just spoken with the Department Chair and he says he'll have all the information ready for you by noon. Would you like us to send a courier or do you need to speak with him? He does have a little time today…"

Sara pursed her lips, and then nodded. "Yeah, actually. If he has the time we'd be grateful to have a conversation with him."

Pleasantries were exchanged and Sara closed her phone, exhaling. "We're meeting with the Department Chair at noon. He says he'll have information on those involved in the production and those attending compiled by then. …I wasn't given the impression that they had any idea about any of this. I don't think the detective spoke with them."

Grissom sighed and nodded, pushing an envelope over to her so she could change her gloves after having touched her cell phone. Without speaking, she slid them off and into the envelope, sealing it and signing over the tape, before filling out the appropriate information. Pulling on a fresh pair, she eyed the things before them and exchanged another meaningful glance with her supervisor. "You want to re-process everything, don't you?"

Her voice was teasing but resigned; she didn't want to do it, but she felt like they had little choice. Even in Vegas they'd have gone over everything again if they were lacking leads, and that was working with the assumption that processing had been done competently the first time around. He smiled at her pursed lips and shook his head.

"Of course not. There's no reason to go over the videos again." He deadpanned, and Sara snorted, half in amusement and half in exasperation. Stupid sub-par CSIs foiled up _her_ serial case.

"…Hey guys. You're already working? Here I thought I was early."

They both turned to look at Nolan, standing in the doorway still in his coat, a cup of Starbucks in hand. Sara narrowed her eyes. "Is your cell phone broken?"

He looked bewildered and patted his pockets, finally locating it in his pocket and pulling it out, presumably scrolling through multiple missed calls. He looked up in alarm. "What's going on?"

Grissom watched Sara visibly set her jaw, and then snapped off his gloves and bagged them. "Come on. I'll explain while you hang up your coat." They moved out of the room, towards the locker room, and Sara let out an angry breath. It had been a good thing that Grissom had stepped in. She wasn't even feeling hormonal and she'd had the urge to rip him a new one.

She hated incompetent CSIs.


	11. Chapter Eight

Disclaimer: I don't own them.

A/N: It's been a while for this one. Sorry to keep you guys waiting. I was working out the details with the evidence. It's surprisingly difficult.

Thanks go to my awesome beta, Pati, who quite literally saves you all from some ridiculous typos.

Hope you guys like it. Review?

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Chapter Eight:

It was just after nine when their detective called and said they were free to come process. Grissom made the decision to go with Nolan to process the hardware store, which the owner had willingly opened for them without the warrant, and left Sara to reprocess the old evidence. They arranged that Sara would put the evidence away, at whatever place she was at, at eleven thirty. If Grissom and Nolan had finished with the hardware store, they would pick her up together to go meet with the chair of the Theatre Department. If it took longer than expected, Nolan would pick her up while Grissom remained behind.

They weren't going to let him do anything alone, from now on.

The ride over to the scene was… awkward. In the locker room, Nolan had been so bewildered by the lead they'd missed that he couldn't speak. And, Grissom even pitied him a little bit. He was a level one getting very little guidance—Craig couldn't expect him to catch every mistake a detective made. To be absolutely fair, it really wasn't within CSI's job description to call the University and get suspect lists. Grissom and Sara were just used to Vegas, where criminalists took initiative and the lines between detective and CSI were not always so clearly drawn.

He was kind, explaining the lead they were following and stating it as the reason they'd come into the lab so early. He said they'd figured they would go over the evidence again while they waited for Nolan to arrive or the detective to call, just in case. …Not that Grissom was above pointing out Nolan's mistakes, especially after dinner the night before, but there was no reason to create more animosity between them until (or unless, he reminded himself) they found something he'd actually missed.

But Nolan had gotten his bearings in the hour and a half between Grissom's explanation and the drive to the scene; and he wasn't any happier with Grissom than the older man was with him. He looked determined, his features set, a crease between his eyebrows. He clearly had not forgotten their confrontation the night before.

"…Are you interested in Sara?"

Grissom raised an eyebrow and glanced at the young man. "She's one of my best CSIs." Probably _the_ best, if he didn't have to worry about her overdoing it and staying up for three days on every case. Still, Grissom didn't like the somewhat relieved look on Nolan's face, so he added after a pause, "…And a beautiful woman."

The young man narrowed his eyes. "You haven't changed a bit since you worked here, have you? Craig was righ—"

"Craig unfairly represented me, apparently, because he has a past with me that it seems he has yet to deal with. I'm sorry that Sara doesn't seem to be falling for your charms, but that has nothing to do with me."

"…What does it have to do with then?" He asked aggressively, but there was a bit of desperation in his voice too. He was really asking what he was doing wrong. Grissom felt a stab of pity, and shook his head, giving the kid a real answer.

"If I could explain the enigma that is woman—specifically, that woman…" He trailed off, but his meaning was clear enough. Nolan frowned, but nodded too. After a long moment, he decided for honesty.

"You want her too, don't you?"

Grissom parked the lab vehicle and gave his younger counterpart a rueful eyebrow raise. "She's yet to meet a man who doesn't." He opened his door and slipped out, ending the conversation.

The hardware store was not truly a hardware store anymore. All the shelves were collapsed and piled along a far wall, there was no inventory, and other than the random, rouge nail lost along the floorboard, it had likely been quite clean when it closed. There was a thick layer of dust over everything, the windows were thoroughly frosted as there had been no heat to warm the place all winter, and there was also no electricity.

Grissom put Nolan to work setting up the portable lighting as they only had one officer on the scene. The uniform in question was diligently standing at his post at the door, wearing multiple layers and looking like he wished very much that he could step inside and close the door, if only to get away from the wind. To Grissom's surprise and satisfaction, Nolan was quite diligent about checking the floor for evidence and hugging the walls as he went about his task, even if there was very little to see.

The front door, which was not covered by any cameras, had a deadbolt that had been broken externally. From there, there was a single row of footprints in the dust from the front door, through the employee door, and up to a window by the back door. Beneath it there was hardly any dust, as if the killer had paced by the window until the right time. Then there were two shoe prints from window to door. He had Nolan taking pictures of all the shoe prints, even though Grissom was well aware that they matched the one they'd found in mud in the alleyway and therefore gave them no new information.

He went to dust for prints on the various doors their killer had to've touched, even if he knew it was unlikely he'd find any. Not only had there been evidence that the killer might have been wearing leather gloves, but in this weather, even innocent people probably wouldn't remove their gloves. The store had not been heated, after all. There were no tools left behind, so the killer had to have taken them with him.

The only thing the scene really told them was that they were right to think that the figure on surveillance tape, coming from this building, had been their killer, and that he'd known his way around the area. He'd known that Collin would use the alley to walk home, he'd known where there were cameras to avoid and he'd known his way through the store. More importantly, he'd apparently had a way to know when Collin was in the alleyway; he'd paced here, waiting, left the building, presumably been the slight shadow disturbing the liquor store lights in their surveillance camera, and killed Collin on the other side of the liquor store.

The windows would have been iced over, the way they were now, and even then, Grissom didn't think they provided a great vantage point. Even if there had been evidence that the killer had cleared the frost away, he probably wouldn't have been able to see even as far as the liquor store.

With a frown, Grissom stepped out the front door, having dusted and found nothing, and moved down to the liquor store. He was mildly surprised to a closed sign on the door, considering that nothing ever closed in Vegas, least of all liquor stores, but there was a clerk inside who came over when Grissom knocked and held up his credentials. The door swung open with the clatter of a bell.

"Can I help you? We don't open for another fifteen minutes…"

"I'm with the Crime Lab. We were here a couple days ago, looking at your surveillance tapes." He showed the young man his identification more closely. "I just had a question about your light out back."

He blinked in surprise, and then stepped back to let Grissom inside. The door fell closed and the man handed the ID back. "I'll help if I can. I don't usually work nights."

"It works on a motion detector, I know, as there were giant gaps in the feed. But how far away can a person be, in the alleyway, and not set off the detector?"

The young man frowned. "I, ah… I don't know. Pretty far, I think. That thing is always turning on, even if there isn't anything on the surveillance. They're both on motion detectors, but the camera runs all day. The light is set to turn on at a certain time each day. I know it sounds weird, but that's why I don't like working nights. If you're alone here and the light keeps flickering on and off, you just _feel_ like there's someone sneaking up behind you. It makes you nervous."

Grissom tilted his head, and then nodded. "Would you be willing to turn the light on for me, briefly? I'd like to run an experiment—figure out exactly how far away we can trigger this thing."

"Oh, sure. You betcha. Do you want me to turn it on right now?"

Grissom smiled a little at the young man's accent and shook his head. "Let me get my people into position. I'll be back."

He cleared the alley, put Nolan inside the hardware store by the iced-over window, and had the clerk turn on the light. He moved to the far entrance of the alley, and slowly took each step at a time, waiting for the one that would set off the light. It was a ways down, but still a good length from the store itself when it turned on. He pulled out his phone and hit send twice; Nolan picked up.

"Yeah, I can just barely see it on. If it had been dark though, it would have been like a giant, flashing target."

"Okay. Come out through the door, and walk along the far side of the alley, like our killer did."

Grissom could easily see the door open and the figure approach. But he was quite a ways down, and in the dark it might have been harder to see. …If Collin had been looking at his feet or… listening to music… anything like that, he could have missed it. At least, until his killer walked into the light, hugging the wall beneath the camera to avoid being caught on tape.

Grissom had Nolan come stand at the place where he had stopped and measured for himself the distance between the light and the young man. Fifty feet, exactly.

"Let's try this one more time," Grissom said, glancing at his watch. They would have just enough time before they would have to leave if they wanted to log in evidence before they headed over to the University. "You go back by the window, I'll go to the edge of the alley. I'll walk at a normal pace, you come out as soon as the light turns on. Walk just slightly faster than normal—you're probably either nervous or jonesing for a kill."

Nolan looked quite alarmed at this description, but hurried back to his place, and Grissom retreated. Moments after, the light went out again. He stored that information away and reminded himself to go over the liquor store footage again, later today.

At the entrance to the alleyway, he strode forward at a normal pace, and watched as the light turned on and the door at the end of the alley swung open. Nolan strode towards him, and he worked to keep his pace measured. They met roughly twenty feet from the light, out of sight of the camera. Grissom glanced around. A few feet behind him was the telltale blood spatter they'd seen a couple days before.

"So, either I was walking too fast, or…"

"He might not have come as far as this. Maybe he saw his attacker and stopped. Or maybe he tried to run. The leather under his nails implies a struggle…"

Grissom looked around again. "Yeah. It does."

Nolan packed up the lights from their scene while Grissom went back into the liquor store. He thanked the young man who'd helped him and introduced himself belatedly, apologizing for not having done so. The clerk identified himself as Alex Olson, which made Grissom smile. Everyone was an Olson here.

They piled back into the lab vehicle and arrived at the lab ahead of schedule. Grissom sent Nolan to print the pictures and log them and the memory card into evidence, while he sought out Sara. She was still in the layout room where they'd left her, and she was eyeing, strangely enough, their original shoeprint.

"What are you working on?"

She frowned, a crease appearing between her eyebrows. "This shoe print. Presumably the killer's. You can see that the person wearing it has too small of feet."

"…The weight isn't evenly distributed?"

"The toe of the shoe hardly left any impression at all. You'd expect the deepest impressions to be the heel and the ball of the foot, and the next deepest along the outside of the sole. Instead, we have the heel, the top part of the sole, and a line along the outside between them, but not close enough to the outside of the shoe to be typical. The print is a men's size twelve; the foot itself is probably a men's nine."

"Autopsy indicated our killer _was_ male—the blows were inflicted with a decent amount of upper body strength."

Sara nodded, but kept looking down at the mold. Grissom tilted his head. "There's something else?"

Her frown deepened and she shook her head. "There is. I just… don't know what. I feel like something is nagging at me and I just can't place it."

Grissom tried to think of what she might be unable to bring into focus, and came up empty. He shrugged. "You'll think of it. Are you coming with us, or staying here?"

"No." She said, packing evidence back up—taping new seals and signing, removing her gloves and signing the envelope into which they went, and then piling everything back into its box, and re-taping and signing the edges of that. "No, I'm coming. Just let me return this. I'll meet you guys downstairs?"

"Sure."

Grissom headed back to the vehicle and pulled it around front. It occurred to him belatedly, after ten minutes in which neither of them appeared, that Nolan and Sara would likely have met in the evidence locker. He frowned, wondering what on earth could be taking them so long, and had half a mind to go inside and search them out. But then they walked out, together, and Sara was laughing. He gripped the steering wheel tighter.

He remembered again why he left Minneapolis. Lab romances were never a good idea, but love triangles in the lab were even worse.


	12. Chapter Nine

Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: I have to start by thanking my amazing beta, Pati, who helped me shape my otherwise struggling story arc and fixed my ridiculous mistakes, once again. Have I mentioned that she's amazing? She is.

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter. I think it's interesting that several of my readers see the words 'love triangle' and think 'threesome', apparently. :P My dirty-minded readers will be happy to hear that the interlude will move them in the right direction. Lol.

Thanks for all the reviews! They were amazing! Keep them coming!

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Chapter Nine:

"Yes, I knew Collin Almquist. Or, well, by sight anyway. He was in Oklahoma! this fall. …The musical." He added, upon seeing Nolan's slightly confused face.

"Who did he play?" Grissom asked Dr. Marshall Stenehjem, the chair of the theatre department. Sara smiled, wondering at Grissom's question; he could be trying to get the man to open up by asking about something he was clearly invested in, or he could be asking because he thought it would give insight into who Collin was or why someone might have chosen him as their victim… or he might just be curious. He was a man who appreciated the arts, after all. Dr. Stenehjem leaned back in his chair with a sigh. He looked, Sara thought, every bit the theatre type he was. His gray hair slightly awry, his striped scarf still wrapped around his neck like an middle-aged Mark Cohen, despite the warm, slightly stuffy office the four of them were packed into, and he spoke with large hand gestures.

"Will Parker. Put on a great audition, let me tell you. Blew us away. Couldn't believe he was a freshman. We talked pretty seriously about casting him as Curly, you know, but you always worry about giving freshman such big roles in their first semesters. College is a shock for some kids—they come in and even if they have the talent, they don't really have the time management or their classes are overwhelming… they don't know how much they can take on until a week before production, when they decide that the test they have next week is more important than the show. Well, that doesn't just affect them, you know—it screws everybody over."

"Did Collin do that?"

"Oh, no. Maxine—she was the director for Oklahoma!—was very impressed with him. He was always early, knew his lines before most of the seniors and grad students did, and never missed a rehearsal for anything. Did any of you get a chance to see the production?" He asked, but rushed on without waiting for an answer. "He was fantastic. Kind of stole the show, if you ask me. It's usually Ado Annie who does that, if anyone, but he played the hell out of it."

"Who played Curly?" Nolan asked, and Sara found herself frowning, which wasn't fair. Sure, he lacked finesse, but then… she was pretty certain she'd been about to ask the same thing, without giving a thought to how it might put Dr. Stenehjem on guard either. Predictably, the man frowned too.

"One of our grad students—Joe Grady. If you're implying that someone in _our _department is responsible for this…"

"Of course not." Sara rushed to assure him. "We're just trying to get a sense of the people Collin would have hung around with. Mr. Grady would have been the other male lead… correct?"

Dr. Stenehjem relaxed visibly. Sara mused that all of his emotions were displayed vividly on his features or in his body language, and wondered if actors habitually overemphasized everything, or if the man had spent so many years expressing emotion openly that he now couldn't rein it in. Maybe she was just used to people being guarded when they spoke to police…

"Oh, Collin's been very active in the theatre department. Comes to all the productions, works lighting and make up on the student-directed plays, helps out in the costume department. He's been a real asset. He even came to the department Christmas party—most freshmen don't attend."

"So it wouldn't have stood out, necessarily, that he attended the drag show this week?"

"Oh no. I don't think he's missed one yet. There's a group of students who puts one on every month or so—our on-campus GLBT student organization helps with that—advertising, funding, etc. They've been really positive—we have strong turn-out from the rest of the student body and it really works to combat some of the more negative stereotypes…"

Sara tilted her head, thinking that it might be confirming some of those stereotypes for the less open-minded members of the student body, but didn't argue with the man. He sounded quite proud of his students' efforts. "And, correct me if I'm wrong, but the show was the last night of finals week? A last hurrah before Christmas break?"

"Something like that. They'd intended to have it the week before, because so many students go home for the break, but several of the performers had a conflict that night. The turn-out was a little low, I guess, but not as much as you'd expect."

"Might have made him easier to pick out in the crowd, though." Grissom commented thoughtfully.

Dr. Stenehjem looked at Grissom, and Sara took the opportunity to really _look_ at the man. She thought maybe her initial once-over had been… short-sighted. He looked rather tired, his eyes were that off-white color of someone who hasn't been sleeping well, and was she just imagining the red rim around them? …When he wasn't over-expressing the expected reactions to his words or their questions—when his face was neutral—he looked sad. Not openly frowning, but his whole face and being drawn downwards as if by extreme gravity. She felt sympathy and suspicion grip her simultaneously. The man had spoken rather fondly of Collin, especially for a man who claimed he only knew the boy by sight. She tested her theory.

"Were they any other students who attended all the productions, the way Collin did? …Maybe they would have noticed if something seemed… off."

Dr. Stenehjem blinked uncertainly. "I, ah… You know, I think… I think Lisa—Schwartz—attends most of them. And… well, Aly Simon and Carl Renwick go to all the drag shows, but I'm not sure if they attend the student-directed plays or the one-acts. …I guess… Erin—Liese—she's probably at most of them."

Nolan, apparently, had picked up Sara's train of thought. "So, you know that Collin attended everything—never missed a drag show—but you can't think of a single other student in your program that you know those kind of details about?"

Dr. Stenehjem visibly flinched and Grissom spoke up. "Did you have the names of the people who were there that night? It might be easier if we just contact them individually…"

"Oh, yes. Of course. Of course." He murmured, obviously flustered, as he dug through his papers and came up with the list he'd promised to Sara, via his secretary. Sara took a moment to glance at Grissom. His body was tensed. Her eyes moved to Nolan, who was opening his mouth to speak again. Sara stepped on his foot, and he turned to her in surprise and shut his mouth, frowning. Lack of finesse was one thing, but blatant accusations were both slanderous and dangerous… and foolhardy. If he were the real killer, not only could he attack them, but he would also have time to hide evidence before they got a warrant.

There were a few other perfunctory questions, but it was not longer than ten minutes later that they were piling back into their vehicle, Sara shivering and wondering if it had gotten colder in the time they'd been inside the building. It certainly felt like it. Nolan was the first to speak, once they had closed the doors around them.

"…He's clearly lying. He knows Collin a lot better than he's letting on. It honestly sounds like he spent the last semester stalking him."

Sara snapped her head over. "…Stalking? I'm sorry, but that man is not a _stalker._ One of my best friends had a man live in his attic and watch him through tiny holes in the ceiling of each room. This guy… He's lost one of his most talented and promising students."

Nolan looked like he'd been blind-sided by Sara—his beacon of hope in a world gone mad—defending a possible killer. "Oh please, who cares _that_ much about a student? He _lied_ to us!"

"Regardless," Grissom broke in, addressing Nolan with as even a tone as he could manage, "we don't have enough to get a warrant, and alerting him to our suspicions is the fastest way to make sure he stops talking to us, gets himself a lawyer, and disposes of anything that might link him to the crime. …Do you ever play poker?"

Nolan blinked in surprise, and then shrugged. "Yeah, I guess. Every now and then."

"Okay. …Talking to anyone in a case is like playing poker. You want to keep them guessing at what you've got, while you figure out exactly what it is they have in their hands. And you do that be reading their body language. …Sara, what do we know about Stenehjem?"

She blinked in surprise, but answered immediately, a perpetual student herself. "He's hiding something. He knows Collin better than we think. But he also looks sad—tired, uncertain. His over-the-top expressions and gestures seem false, like he's overcompensating to hide how he really feels. So he doesn't want us to think he isn't guilty—he wants us to think he isn't as upset at he is..."

Nolan frowned, and Grissom sighed. "You can think he's guilty—we'll follow him up as a suspect either way. And if he's guilty, that'll come out; the evidence never lies. …But confronting him this early, without evidence or an officer present, is just asking for trouble. Don't show your hand too early. Make them show you what they have because they're trying so hard to figure out what you have."

Nolan sat for a moment, brooding, and then nodded. "…So what do we do now?" His voice was still tight, but the way he looked at Grissom had changed. There was a level of respect there now, under the surface. Sara wondered if Nolan had had a mentor, before this—whether anyone at his lab had bothered to take him under their wing and explain these things. The kid was doing pretty well for himself, if he was just figuring every out as he went…

Grissom cleared his throat. "His shoes didn't have a tread pattern even remotely like the killer's… which means we'll need a warrant, for his shoes and his DNA. Right now we don't have anything that could get us a warrant. Do we even know if he's been in Vegas?"

"Bet one of his students could tell us." Nolan piped up, feeling a little more confident.

Sara smiled, "Good thing we have a list of students then…"

"On a piece of paper with his fingerprints," Grissom pointed out.

Sara grinned, reminded once again why she idolized this man.

As Grissom turned them back towards and lab and Sara neatly slid the papers he'd given them into an evidence bag, Nolan peered out the window. "It got cold fast, huh? We're supposed to get something like ten inches of snow before Christmas."

Momentarily distracted, Sara smiled wistfully. "I remember the first big snow in Boston. …I dragged my roommate out—she was from Colorado, so she was used to snow—but I dragged her outside to play with me, because I'd never seen snow before. At least, not more than a sprinkling on the grass and sidewalks when I walked to class in the morning. And so I'm trying to make a snowball—and failing—and plopping into the snow to make a snow angel, and she tells me that we should go convince some kids to stick their tongues to a pole..."

Nolan snorted. "Nice friend."

Grissom smirked, anticipating Sara's story. "You didn't believe her…"

She blushed, but grinned with the memory. "I didn't have any idea what she was talking about, at first. But no, when she told me that it would stick, I didn't believe her. Apparently I was never exposed to that one movie, where the kid does it—"

"A Christmas Story." Nolan supplied, and Sara nodded.

"So while I should have believed her, I thought—there's no way a pole would be that cold. Theoretically it would be possible, but more than likely my tongue would just melt the frost on the pole…"

"How long did she let you sit there before she got the warm water?" Grissom asked.

Sara, this time, was the one who snorted out her laugh. "She didn't! She said it was payback for making her come out in the snow. I had to pull it off."

Despite Sara having laughed herself, she was not altogether pleased to get that reaction from her male counterparts. …And certainly not to the extent that she did. They apparently had never heard anything so funny, and after more than a minute of their laughter, she decided to put an end to it.

"It's not funny! It actually really hurt. …I cried." She stated, emphatically, hoping that would garner her more sympathy. It did not. Instead, the men in the car laughed harder, and Sara rolled her eyes, scowling. "It was traumatic. Don't laugh at that."

Nolan stopped, but Grissom continued, his chuckle filling the car and leaving Sara wondering when she'd last heard him so… happy. Ignoring Nolan's frown, she started laughing too, thinking that she would tell a hundred embarrassing stories if it made him laugh like this again. It was surprisingly… nice. Not just to hear him laugh—but to tell him funny things about being young, rather than just the traumatic. …It was nice that he knew things about her than no one else—except Nolan, she amended with irritation—did.

Intimate, kind of.

She grinned the entire way back to the lab.


	13. Interlude Three

Disclaimer: I dont' own them.

A/N: Sorry for the delay in posting. I've been busy with school, planning the wedding (just over four months now!), and working on a one-shot that will hopefully be up soon. Oh, and I should have another chapter of Attrition up this week too!

Thanks, as always, to Pati, who is beyond amazing.

Hope you guys enjoy!

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Interlude Three:

Grissom watched Sara sleep.

She was curled up, her long, slender body folding neatly and compactly together, conserving body heat. Strands of her hair had fallen from where her curls had been piled atop her head that night, leaving her looking tousled and childlike.

He watched her eyelids flicker, her eyelashes long and dark on her pale cheeks.

She had her coat hugged tightly around her, the blanket pulled up to her chin. There was more makeup on her face than he was used to seeing, but it was still subtle and sweet; her lips were almost bubblegum in their pinkness, but her eyelids were darker—brown tones, and eyeliner.

He watched her nose wrinkle on an otherwise smooth, relaxed face, and appreciated the beauty of her gently parted lips.

She exhaled, and for the first time Grissom realized that her breath was visible in the air, if only barely. And suddenly, a small shiver moved through her sleeping frame, sending a pang through Grissom as well.

He was watching her freeze.

She turned her face towards his warm fingers as they skimmed her cold cheeks, and he realized how cold she must be, with him blocking the heat from the fire and the windows on the other side of her. It had only been a couple hours since they had both slipped into sleep, but she was noticeably colder than him.

Slowly, carefully, he moved close to her, contemplating how to move her. He could get up, out of the warm bed, and lift her and scoot her… but he wasn't sure that she would sleep through that any more than she would through an attempt to roll her. And, if he tried the latter, he would stay warmer and… Well, and get to touch her.

Platonically, of course.

He slowly wriggled a hand between the pillow beneath her head and her neck, and clutched her shoulders tightly. Moving his body up close and letting his other hand wind around her waist, he tilted her towards his body until her head came to rest on his chest. Bracing her body against his and lifting his left hand from her shoulders to gently press her head to his chest, he slowly lifted and rolled her over the top of him, until she came to rest on the other side, between him and the fireplace.

She shifted into her new position, turning her back to him, and blinked blearily. A soft, confused murmur fell from lips that looked even softer. "Grissom?" He shushed her gently, though, and her heavy lids closed immediately, her breathing evening out. He thought about backing away, into the cold spot that Sara had occupied, rather than hovering in the middle and clinging to her, but…

Well, it was rather cold, and he needed to keep his temperature up if he was going to care for her. But pressed up against her back was plenty warm, and if he too laid on his side, he could feel the heat of the fire slip over her, onto him. And really, there was just no comfortable place for his right arm but tucked beneath her head, nor for his left, except resting just above her hip. Even through her coat—that thin, foolish little coat of hers—he could feel the gentle curve of her body as it moved downwards.

Sara, he knew, would not mind these little steps he was taking in order to protect her, and himself in the process. After all, she had risen so beautifully to the occasion of taking care of him, earlier that evening. He did not know whether he'd truly been at risk for hypothermia, but he did know that he'd never been so cold in his life. The wind had come against the corner of the cabin, meaning that both the front and the side harboring the wood bin had offered no shelter from the cold at all.

Truth be told, _rising to the occasion_ was an understatement if there ever was one. Sara Sidle, believing they would be trapped for a few hours—maybe until late tomorrow morning, at worst—had done her best to prepare them for days of being trapped. In doing so, she very well may have saved not only his life—because that much was already fairly obvious—but hers as well.

There was no way to know if anyone was coming for them.

Assuming that the person he'd reached at the Crime Lab had understood him—a stretch—and knew where to look for this tiny, obscure cabin, it would just be until the rescue crews could get here. That alone left them in a precarious position. The roads were awful, yes, but they would be covered in snow by now—out in the middle of nowhere like this, their rescuers would struggle to determine where the gravel roads even were. Hell, he and Sara had barely been able to navigate their way here.

He cursed again at how foolish he'd been, continuing to drive her further and further into harm's way, simply because he was stewing in his own anger. It truly wasn't Sara's fault for what had happened tonight. And yet he'd blamed her, as he always did.

Even if the roads weren't covered, blizzards could go on for days, and way out in the country, away from buildings to act as wind blocks, the visibility could go down to mere feet. There was no way they'd be able to find them, here, with that kind of obstacle—even if they did risk sending someone way out here in weather like this.

All of this was operating under the presumption that the person on the phone had actually heard anything he'd said. If not… Well, Nolan knew where they were, but it was Christmas Eve and he was drunk and angry. It was entirely possible that they wouldn't be noticed missing for at least another couple days. Sure, Craig might think it strange that they weren't in the lab, working the case, no matter the date—but then, Craig wouldn't be in the lab all that much himself.

The situation looked bleak, and it was entirely possible that they'd have to find a way to break up the table to keep the fire going once they'd used up the chairs. They'd have to keep the fire going through the day, too, and though the cans of food were enough to keep them alive for several days, they would be quite hungry if they had to stretch it out that far.

Which was another reason he allowed himself the luxury of pressing against her back, just to feel her body slowly rise and fall with each, precious breath—he knew that in a short amount of time, they would not be relaxed and warm and comfortable. Soon they would be cold and hungry and irritable—and worried—and they would probably fight. Even if things had been better in the last year, he was not naïve enough to believe that they would not argue in that situation. To some extent, it was an ingrained part of how they communicated.

So he would savor the peace of the moment and the closeness of her—the sweet smell of her, warm and homey. It would be something to keep with him, when this situation took a turn for the worse.

And it would. That was almost a given. It was just a matter of when and how long it might last.

He let his eyes close, but they slid open mere moments later as the brunette in his arms stirred and then rolled to face him, tucking her face back against his chest, her head under his chin. He blinked as an ache within him made itself known and his arms tightened around her slender form. Even as he was aware of his own sadness that this was the first and probably only time he would hold her like this, he felt a fierce protectiveness sweep through him and override that emotion.

He would do everything to make sure she got out of this experience unscathed, and that she would get some time off to make up for the Christmas she'd missed with… whomever.

His gut twisted at that. Nolan had asked him if Sara was seeing anyone, and it had been at that moment he'd realized that she must be. She hadn't taken off a single holiday in the five and a half years she'd worked for him, and suddenly she'd taken off a week? How had he not put the pieces together before? He'd simply been happy that she was taking a little time off; she'd seemed stressed lately. It hadn't occurred to him that it was not just a long weekend she was taking. It was some serious vacation time, for her, and over a holiday.

She was probably going to spend Christmas with this guy's family. Out of town, if he didn't miss his guess—she'd mentioned finding a place to do laundry before they left, so she wouldn't have to bother with packing and unpacking. …Of course, that was back when she'd foolishly thought she'd be leaving Minnesota before Christmas.

He never should have dragged her here. She deserved to have a life, especially since he had refused her offers to have one with him, more times than he could count. He didn't like it, but… He did want her to be happy. He did. He just couldn't be witness to it—to anyone else having her. He'd proven as much tonight.

But she was clearly involved with someone. He probably shouldn't be holding her, like this, when he knew she belonged to someone else, but he couldn't make himself pull away. Her legs had intertwined with his when she'd turned to him, and she finally looked warm and comfortable. She was sleeping without hugging herself, and she seemed more relaxed. And she was just so… beautiful.

More than that. She was the epitome of "woman" in every sense; she had brains and beauty, and her share of brawn, she was feisty and independent and still affectionate and loving and sweet. She filled him up to the point of overflowing with her mere presence, and he felt himself getting wistful.

How could he let her go when, after all this time, he knew that he had been too late? That she would wake and the dream would die?

So he didn't. He clung to her tightly, soaked up her warmth, and let himself slip into sleep beside her. At least that was one dream fulfilled. It would have to be enough.


	14. Chapter Ten

Disclaimer: I don't own them.

A/N: I can't tell you how good it feels to be posting on this story again. :) Let me know what you guys think!

As always, thank you Pati, for making my work decent. I owe you so much.

Finally, everyone should make their way over to CSI Forever Online (csiforeveronline . wetpaint . com) and see the site! GSRFO might have died, but here we're rebuilding what was lost, and better, with ILoveJorja as our fearless leader. Think how much amazing fanfiction comes out of the challenges from these sites! Go join-You won't be disappointed.

* * *

Chapter Ten:

"Gil! Sara! Just the people I was looking for!"

Nolan and the Vegas CSIs looked up in surprise as Craig stepped through the door into their little layout room. Grissom raised a rather cool eyebrow at the man, not appreciating the apparent reputation Craig's lingering bitterness had given him, nor the apparent lack of guidance Nolan had received from his supervisor, but Sara smiled indulgently. He was so buoyant and sociable that he was hard to dislike.

"Listen, there's a lab Christmas party this Friday, the 23rd. I wanted to make sure you knew you were invited. Dinner, dancing, plenty of egg nog…"

Nolan looked up hopefully, while Sara and Grissom frowned. Sara glanced at her watch, apparently seeking out the date, because she sighed a moment later. "I had been hoping we'd wrap this case up before Christmas. But, unless there's a break in the case pretty quick here… We'll probably be in town. Don't you think, Griss?"

Grissom shook his head. It was the 21st today. If they didn't get something big by the morning of the 23rd, he'd send Sara home. It was the first time she'd taken Christmas off in six years, at least, and he wasn't going to let her spend it here, in a hotel room, eating room service and warding off a Nolan who'd had a little too much cinnamon schnapps in his hot chocolate.

"We won't be able to make it." It was a final kind of statement that left a surprised silence in its wake, and Craig cleared his throat after a moment.

"…Okay, then, Gil. I hope you enjoy whatever else you'll be doing that night. Nolan—let me steal you for a minute. The undersheriff has some questions about the homicide in the Metrodome bathroom last month."

Nolan nodded, giving an uncertain glance over his shoulder on his way out, and Craig followed behind him, choosing not to comment on Grissom's apparent rudeness. Sara, however, raised a questioning eyebrow in his direction, and he sighed, shaking his head and remaining silent. She broke first, as usual.

"…Is there a reason you're being cryptic to the point of rudeness, or is it just habit for you now?" Her words were hard, but the teasing pucker of her lips was so, so soft. He found himself smiling, and replying gently, rather than responding tit for tat.

"Sara… Unless something huge comes up in the next couple days… I want you to leave on the 23rd. No reason for you to miss your Christmas plans when we're still playing catch-up on this case. You can come back out whenever you're done. In fact—I'll charge it to the lab. Ecklie hasn't had any reason to yell at me for a long time. It'll be like a Christmas present for him."

She looked surprised for a long moment, and when she finally spoke… It wasn't what he wanted to hear. Not that he knew what it was he did want to hear. It just… It wasn't this.

"…Are you sure?" She asked, instead of protesting, like he'd expected. He wanted to ask where she was going, and with whom, that was so important that she would not even argue with him. Instead, he offered her a bland smile.

"I'm sure. I'll probably spend a couple days getting us back on track and double-checking our evidence. By the time you come back we'll be just getting started again." They both knew better—you couldn't predict when the right piece of evidence would come along, or the associations you'd make, and therefore the timeline of solving a case was… unpredictable.

She nodded, looking around at the evidence piled around them on the layout table, all of it adding up to nothing. "Should we just call it a day? We won't have anything to go on until we get fingerprints back, or until the detective—what's his name?—can get something from one of the students. And I'm beat."

They _had_ been in the lab for much longer than a normal shift, having rushed in early that morning, but it was weird for Sara to want to quit early, especially when they'd hit a dead end. He took a moment to run his eyes over her critically, noticing that she seemed tired, her features drawn, her shoulders slumped. She wasn't her normal self right now, so he nodded.

"Yeah, let's call it a day. If you don't mind packing everything up, I think I'm going to go have a talk with Detective What's-His-Name before we go…" He murmured with a slight smirk, and she smiled in response, nodding her assent.

They managed to slip out of the lab with only a note left with the receptionist letting Nolan know they were leaving, but could be reached should something come up with the case. Sara didn't realize she was holding her breath until they pulled out of the lab parking lot, and she released it in relief. Grissom glanced at her out of the side of his eyes, and she gave a sheepish shrug.

"It's just… I was certain he'd end up tagging along again. Who can relax when they're constantly being… fawned over?" Grissom felt his chest swell up happily, but Sara frowned, wondering at her own words. Had Grissom felt that way about her, early on? She couldn't deny that she had been a bit… Well, obsequious, really.

When he didn't answer, she figured that he must be thinking along the same lines as she was, and turned her gaze out the window with a quiet, troubled hum. She watched a Laundromat slip past them, and contemplated the logistics of flying out on Friday. "…I'll have to find some place to do laundry. I don't want to have to do it in Vegas, or repack all new clothes…" Her flight was a red eye leaving around 2 am on Christmas Eve, so if she was flying from here to Vegas the day before… Well, she just really didn't have time to mess around with her clothing. She'd stop at home and trade out her kit for her small pile of Christmas gifts—leaving some at the lab on the way back to the airport, of course—and then be in the air again.

Grissom cleared his throat after a minute. "Our hotel would probably have laundry service. That might be easier."

She wrinkled her nose in distaste. "And have strangers mixing my whites with my colors and permanent pressing my delicates? Using a soap that'll make me itch and fabric softener that doesn't soften and dryer sheets that make me sneeze..."

He smiled a little indulgently as they pulled into the hotel parking lot. "Well, we could find a place tonight. Pick up pizza or Chinese—or even go before dinner time—do it all fast and be done with it…"

The idea of Grissom helping her rinse out her blood-stained panties and measuring out detergent for her was… well, simultaneously laughable and mortifying. She gave an awkward shrug, hoping her discomfort was not clear on her face. "I dunno… It's a strange city, and Laundromats give me the heebie-jeebies. I mean, logically I know that they are by nature clean… but thinking about the bodily fluids that go into them is just…" She cringed and clasped her hands in agitation at the thought of the baby diarrhea, toddler snot, preschool potty accidents… The vaginal and seminal fluids, the blood, the sweat, the tears. "…Maybe I'll just suck it up and wash clothes when I get there."

Where? Grissom wondered, but did not ask. Instead, he just nodded and slid out of the lab vehicle. He wanted to suggest they order food anyway, and make a night of it. He wanted to push the laundry issue, just because it felt… intimate. He wanted her to curl up in his bed with him and fall asleep with her head on his chest.

He did not voice any of that, but rather walked beside her, taciturn, into the lobby and into the elevator, feeling awkward. Uncomfortable. Like he was under scrutiny, a specimen under the microscope. Of course he knew that she could not know what he'd been thinking-but-not-saying, but the idea left him… self-conscious.

Sara sighed softly as the doors closed, leaning against the back wall of the elevator and rolling her head to the side, offering him a tired smile. "So… Does that pizza offer still stand, even without the chance to see my panties?"

Grissom did not have anything in his mouth, and yet he still managed to choke at her words. Her lips puckered playfully at his alarm, pleased that _she_ could fluster _him_ for a change, even if he recovered after a moment. "Who says I won't still have the chance?"

She grinned, not answering him, and took that as a yes.


	15. Chapter Eleven

Disclaimer: I don't own them.

A/N: I just wanted to thank all my loyal readers for reading and reviewing. I hope you're enjoying this as much as I am. :)

As always, thanks to Pati, my beta, who is awesome beyond belief.

Finally, once again, everyone head over to csiforeveronline . wetpaint . com. It's wonderful. And their fanfiction challenge has been giving me hell for a week. Lol.

* * *

Chapter Eleven:

"Ohhh god, so good!" Sara moaned.

Grissom looked at her out of the side of his eyes as she devoured her slice of pizza, the hot, stringy cheese still hanging from the piece as she bit into it. He'd never heard her so… excited… about eating. He squirmed, and picked up his own slice. Black olives, mushrooms, and artichokes wouldn't normally be his first choice, but it was looking really good at this point. Maybe because of her enthusiasm, or maybe because he was starving. He'd only realized, as he was placing their order, that they hadn't eaten anything since breakfast, early that morning.

She plopped onto his bed like it was a perfectly natural thing to do—like she was accustomed to plopping onto his bed. He felt a strange sort of whimsy course through him as she picked the side of the bed he didn't sleep on, simultaneously thrilled and panicked at the idea of her invading his personal space.

"So, is Ecklie buying us a movie, too?" She asked with a smirk, picking up the remote in her pizza-free hand and scanning through the movie selection on the TV, ready to charge one to the room and, therefore, the Crime Lab. He couldn't help but smirk too, toeing off his shoes and sliding more cautiously than she had onto the empty space on the bed. Her bare feet were crossed at the ankles, near the pizza box that was resting on the edge of the bed, her toes painted red.

He never in a million years would have guessed red, and it was making his heart beat erratically.

He turned his nervous gaze to the screen as Sara paged through the movies being offered—The Fog, The Legend of Zorro, Chicken Little, RENT, and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. She took another bite of her pizza and glanced over at him. "Any preference?"

He swallowed and forced himself to turn to her, forced himself to treat this as something that was within his realm of comfort and control. If she were Catherine, he would not think it strange that she'd sprawled on his bed, chewing her pizza and deciding for them that they'd be ordering a movie. That was just Catherine. It helped, a little, and he relaxed.

"Slim pickings. I guess my natural inclination would be Zorro, but modern versions never seem to compare to originals, do they?"

She rolled her eyes and selected the movie, going through the steps to charge it to the room, before sitting up, snagging herself another slice of pizza and leaning back on the pillows. "Give it a chance. I've had a thing for Antonio Banderas ever since "Evita". All that smoldering angst with an accent to boot…"

He grinned, imagining a much younger Sara swooning through the musical, and for a while they sat in comfortable silence, enjoying the film with little commentary. They were at least twenty minutes in before she started… squirming. It was subtle, at first. Inconspicuous repositioning. A slight crease between her eyes. Eventually, however, she'd tucked her legs up close to her body, and had a grimace on her face that was nothing but pain.

He tried not to make it obvious that he was watching her, cataloguing her movements, analyzing each facial fluctuation… and he tried to figure out what could be causing her pain. Maybe the pizza wasn't agreeing with her? He'd had it too, and he'd felt fine. Maybe she was sick. She had been a little… off… the whole time they'd been here, hadn't she? Emotional, stressed, tired, and she'd practically cried the other night when he offered her Advil…

Oh.

_Oh._

Despite himself, and the obvious pain she was in, he smiled a little. It was strangely… intimate… knowing things like this about her. The only thing he thought could make it better—make them even closer, in this particular situation—would be if he could offer her comfort. He was no expert on the less scientific aspects of a woman's menstrual cycle—having had only one truly serious relationship, as opposed to his so often short-lived affairs—but he thought that he could figure this out. It was biology.

She was probably experiencing cramps, caused by her uterus contracting to shed its lining, which could cause back pain as well, he knew. Other symptoms could be anything from body aches and headaches to mood swings. But she didn't seem particularly moody. Tonight, anyway. No, she just seemed… uncomfortable.

Without preamble, he slid from the bed, digging in his suitcase for a moment and then stepping into the bathroom, filling one of their complimentary cups with cold water before turning the tap to hot and letting it warm a bit. He heard her shifting on the bed, and imagined her battling her desire to overtalk in an attempt to understand his sudden departure. The bathroom door was wide open, so using the facilities wasn't an explanation she could fall back on.

He smiled a little, filling his hot water bottle with the hot water and retrieving the bottle of Advil from the counter top. After attempting to carry all three in two hands, he opted to shake out two pills into his palm, and carry the glass of water with his thumb and forefinger.

Stepping out of the bathroom, his home remedies in hand, he saw that though she hadn't moved from her position on the bed, her eyes flickered between him and the TV, back and forth, as he came closer.

"Here." He handed her the water. She sat up in confusion, frowning and taking it, and then holding out her other hand when he offered his closed fist to her. The painkillers fell from one palm to the other, and she looked at him with a question in her eyes, her cheeks pinkening with the answer. He shrugged, going for the enigmatic, unquestionable look he liked to don in all those moments in which he felt he gave a little too much away—to her or anyone—and passed her the hot water bottle before sliding back into his spot.

He pretended to watch Zorro sweep Catherine Zeta Jones off her feet while really watching Sara, out of the side of his eyes, as she swallowed the pills and then positioned the bottle in the small of her back. She did not thank him, or acknowledge his gesture, probably because he hadn't really acknowledged it himself. But her gentle sigh of relief as she laid back spoke volumes, and his heart swelled.

He hadn't known real closeness—or real happiness, for that matter—since Leda.

It was a nice feeling, he decided, and let his eyes close.

* * *

It was much darker.

He thought he might still be in his hotel room, but the details were fuzzy. No TV, no light to distinguish furniture or room details. He knew he was lying down, and after a moment he realized he was in a bed, for sure, and that there was something above him.

No, not something. Someone. Who?

He realized his eyes were closed, and opened them.

Sara. Oh god, she was beautiful in the darkness, and he didn't know if that made sense, but it was true. She was moving above him, pushing away blankets and settling herself to rest on his thighs, and though panic flared, it was muted.

Maybe it was the darkness, making it feel just a little unreal. Maybe not. He remembered his revelation from earlier tonight, and wondered if she would still let him make love to her, or if he would need to please her in other ways to make sure she was completely satisfied. He would have flipped her over and begun just that, but his limbs were heavy, and he felt… confused. He was very confused.

Most of the women he'd been with, he'd never been intimate with during their times of the month, but with Leda… Well, he supposed it was normal, in a relationship, to not let something like a little blood come between a couple. Some people were squeamish, but he was willing to bet that the majority of people in committed relationships…

Sara. He was here with Sara, and he was thinking about Leda? Foolish, foolish man.

No, it was Sara's soft hands trailing over his chest. Sara's husky voice laughing in the darkness. Her luscious, smirking lips laying wet, teasing kisses lower and lower as his clothing fell away. Sara's soft hair on his inner thighs. Sara's wet mouth covering him, making him shudder. He wasn't generally a fan of teeth during fellatio, but the idea of being able to feel her gap, _there_…

He groaned, and the vocalization came with movement. His hands slid down, threading through her silky curls, enjoying her ministrations for a long moment before tugging her up, up, up, back up to him. He kissed her, and tongued the gap, and pull back breathlessly. "…Let me make love to you?" It was more than a request—it was a plea from the darkest recesses of his being, containing so much more that was left unspoken, and she answered him by sliding down onto him, her wet heat enveloping him in nothing short of rapture.

Suddenly, the need to see her was paramount. He needed to catalogue her facial expressions, her reactions. He needed to see his fingers slide up the smooth expanse of her abdomen and watch her breasts bounce as they moved together. See her when she went over the edge, see the fire in her eyes that was so distinctly Sara that there was a part of him that thought he had fallen in love with her for that alone.

He threw an arm out, fumbling, until he hit the switch on the cheap hotel lamp, and artificial light filled the space. His eyes closed at the sudden onslaught, but she was moving now, and he forced them open, unwilling to miss a moment…

"Ahh!" He let out a strangled scream and sat straight up in bed, looking around himself in bewilderment, a cold sweat sliding down his temples. He was in his hotel room, Sara asleep on the bed beside him, the pizza box hanging precariously off the edge of the bed, the TV once again going through the movie selections. Sara shifted in her sleep, and he realized that his heart was pounding, and that he had an erection straining against his pants that would be impossible to hide if she woke right now.

He hurried to his bathroom, closing the door tightly before splashing cold water on his face, over and over, willing his hands to stop shaking.

It was not that he'd had a sex dream about Sara—he was a man who'd fantasized about a woman he'd never touched for eight years. Sex dreams about Sara were commonplace, really. And falling asleep in the same bed with her, well… it should have been expected.

No, the thing that left him looking white as a sheet and clutching the basin of the sink as if his life depended on it had been what happened, in his dream, when the lights turned on.

Long, lean torso, skin shimmering gold in the lamp light, petite, perfect breasts, long, dark curls… and a perfect, white, straight-toothed mouth, curled in a dark smile, and topped with even darker eyes.

Leda Johnson. Not Sara Sidle.


	16. Chapter Twelve

Disclaimer: I don't own them.

A/N: I'm sorry for those who have been hoping for an update to The Path Ahead. I have this one stuck on my brain! :) I hope you enjoy this anyway. I'm really excited for it.

Thanks, as always, go to my awesome beta, who makes my work readable. She wins.

Review?

* * *

Chapter Twelve:

"Hey Griss?"

He jumped, nearly spilling his coffee down the front of his white shirt. As it was, he set his mug down testily, wiping the still-hot liquid from the hand that had held it, and dismaying at the spatter of dark stains along his shirt cuff.

Sara smirked, apparently not nearly as on-edge about their falling asleep in bed together as he was. "Sorry… Uh, fingerprint results are in on the theatre guy—Stenehjem. They don't match the prints at Vince's scene, but they do match prints Nolan found when he processed Collin's apartment. He's lying about how well he knew Collin."

He nodded, still blotting his sleeve. "Okay… see if Detective Larson—that's 'What's-his-Name' to you—" he added with a smirk, "can get a judge to issue a warrant for his shoes and DNA on that alone. It'd be better to get access to his whole home, but…"

"Got it." She nodded, and was off without another word.

Grissom allowed himself a long moment with his eyes closed, drawing in a deep breath and holding it, exhaling slowly. He'd been jumpy since his dream the night before, and hadn't even tried to go back to sleep. He'd sat in the uncomfortable hotel chair for a long while, his hands gripping his thighs to stop their trembling, watching Sara sleep. Knowing how little rest she usually got—and how much pain she'd been in, earlier in the night—he was reluctant to wake her.

She'd started stirring around six, and he had collected fresh clothing and headed into the bathroom to shower and change. When he emerged, his hair wet and his feet bare, but otherwise the picture of professionalism, she had returned to her room, leaving the door between their rooms ajar. They didn't talk about it over breakfast, and he had assumed she was as uncomfortable as he was, but…

Well, she didn't seem to be.

Detective Larson apparently had a good relationship with this judge, because they waited less than an hour to get the warrant, and it was for his home and office, as well as DNA and footwear. Grissom sent Nolan to Stenehjem's office with a black-and-white, and told him to meet up with them at the house when he'd finished.

The man had not seemed particularly nervous when they'd met with him, so Grissom doubted very much there was anything to be found in his office. But it had to be done, so despite his desire to demonstrate to Nolan a better way to deal with suspects, he sent him off, and kept Sara to process the house.

He was at home, as was expected, with school out for Christmas break. He looked alarmed at the intrusion, and affronted at being expected to step outside, into the cold, while they did their investigation. He was even more affronted at the offer of a warm police car, and stood defiantly in the snow that had drifted onto his front porch, his mittened hands tucked under his arms, while Sara swabbed the inside of his cheek.

At first, there didn't seem to be much. None of his shoes—not even the ones he was wearing—matched the tread mark found in the alley behind the Hardware and Liquor stores, and none of the knives in his kitchen—not even the box-cutter in the junk-drawer—had any trace of blood on them. And, of course, they did not find the boys' missing penises anywhere. Sara was privately a little grateful for that, and turned her attention to the leather jacket tucked in the back of his walk-in closet.

Her gloved fingers pulled it out, hooking the hanger over the top of the door frame and examining the sleeves for signs of a struggle, or blood. She did not find what she was looking for, and sighed in relief, deciding that this could not be the source of the leather under Collin's fingernails. Stenehjem still had to account for his fingerprints at Collin's house, and his DNA would be run against the sample found at Vince's scene, but it was looking like he was innocent. The man had truly just cared for his student… probably too much, but she could hardly fault him for that, could she?

A low whistle came from behind the jacket, and she tugged it aside to see Grissom standing there, his eyes directed upwards. "Did you catch this?"

"What?" She asked in surprise, pulling the jacket down and turning it around. Along the shoulders, there were distinct lines where the leather had been scraped, each roughly the size of a fingernail, five on either shoulder.

She and Grissom's eyes met, and she sensed that he was just as disappointed as she that Stenehjem might, after all, be guilty.

They bagged the jacket, finished their search of the home, and made their way out to the red-faced man, surrounded by equally-cold officers. Detective Larson stepped up, exchanged a few quick words with Grissom, and then turned to the indignant thespian with a stern expression.

"I think you'd better come with us, Dr. Stenehjem."

The man looked alarmed, and Sara turned her face away, disliking the uneasy feeling in her chest.

* * *

Detective Larson stood beside the three CSIs in the tiny observation room, the two-way mirror revealing the middle-aged man to be exceedingly uncomfortable in the interrogation room. "Well, we'll see if we can get any information out of him. How long will it take to determine if the jacket is the same as under the vic's nails?"

"They're rushing it." Grissom said, not turning to address the man, but rather watching their suspect with dark eyes.

This did not really answer his question, but the detective nodded anyway. "Let's hope he gives something up, then. Because the jacket alone isn't enough to convict…"

When none of them responded, Sara nodded bleakly, and he slipped from the room, stepping into the interrogation a moment later.

"…Even if it's a match, the shoulders… I can see how the struggle might have played out, but it isn't really common for a victim to get that close, even when it's as up-close-and-personal as a stabbing…" Sara murmured, quietly, into the stillness of the room.

Nolan nodded, and his voice came softly too, as if he were picking up on the seriousness of the other two CSIs in the room. "If he had a personal relationship with the victim, he might easily claim that it came about in other, more… uh, intimate… ways. "

Both Sara and Grissom, staring unblinkingly at Stenehjem through the two-way-mirror, their arms crossed, nodded. From within the room, their suspect was spelling his name for the record to a handheld recording device. It wasn't until he'd finished that Grissom spoke up.

"Well, if he is guilty… he either got rid of any pertinent evidence after we spoke to him, or he's keeping it somewhere else. Garbage around his home didn't yield anything, and it hasn't been picked up in that neighborhood since Monday…"

"So what do we do?" Nolan asked, a little hopelessly, finally getting frustrated with the quiet stillness of the two figures beside him.

Sara sighed softly. "We start digging."


	17. Interlude Four

Disclaimer: I don't own CSI.

A/N: Sorry for the long delay between postings. What with the business around the holidays, a new semester starting, and a myriad of other RL concerns, I've been a little preoccupied, but I hope I haven't lost any of you!

I do want to take a moment to offer an explanation for Grissom's dream about Leda, being as I received more than one less-than-approving review, and while a part of me wishes to grin and bear it in silence-you take good reviews with bad, after all-another part of me feels compelled to explain. It is unfair and illogical to assume that because Grissom had a dream in which he turned out to be having sex with Leda, he is necessarily still in love with her, or wants her instead of Sara. Dreams are not so straightforward, and oftentimes represent more about your fears and what is on your mind than your actual desires. Grissom being back in a place where he obviously had the relationship with this woman would naturally bring her to forefront of his mind, especially considering the similarities we know she and Sara share, and the constant references to his past conflict with office romances and love triangles. The fact that he initially thought it was Sara, and was enjoying the experience, and yet woke up terrified, in a cold sweat, when it turned out to be Leda, does not indicate his desire for the latter, but rather his lingering issues with the woman in question, and his repulsion at the idea of being intimate with her again. The tone of the dream matters as much as the actual events. ...So, I hope that clears things up.

I also wanted to take time to thank Lady L Shardlake, whose persistence encouraged me to finally get around to posting again. And, of course, my super awesome so-much-more-than-a-beta, Pati, who loves this chapter for its ickyness. :)

Enjoy.

* * *

Interlude Four:

She was warm when she woke, which was a good sign. She'd been freezing when she fell asleep.

She blinked sleepily, seeing that the fire in front of her face was dwindling, and would need more wood and more kindling. She frowned. The fire should not be in front of her face, because she'd been on the other side of Grissom.

Which was when she realized that someone had their arms around her from behind, and it was not the abominable snow man.

She looked over her shoulder to find his also-sleepy eyes open, showing slight apprehension over how she might react, waking like this. She blinked uncertainly, and he rolled onto his back, freeing her from his embrace, leaving her considerably cooler.

She swallowed and sat up, a hand immediately moving up to her hair, which had fallen out in the night. With some difficulty, she pulled the pins out, ran her fingers through it in an attempt to brush at least the larger tangles out, and then twisted it into a knot on the back of her head. She dug in her pocket to find the pen she always kept there, and stuck it through her hair, effectively securing it.

She glanced again at Grissom. He was still lying down, the covers up to his chin, and he was eyeing her with a mixture of concern and apprehension. The minute the thought entered her mind, her eyes flicked down his body, but his legs were bent, keeping the blankets from resting against… any kind of natural morning reaction particular to men.

She felt her face get hot and slid her feet out the side of the bed, moving to the fire and stoking it back up, adding kindling and wood, until it was burning brightly once more. She heard him sit up just as she ran out of things to do with her hands, and scanned the hearth before her in the dim lighting for something to occupy herself.

"We have… one can of green beans, one can of pork and beans, and four cans of Cream of Mushroom soup." She eyed their food options distastefully. "…Do you think there's any chance we'll be rescued today?" As if responding directly to her question, the wind outside blew more fiercely against the side of the cabin, whistling through the poorly-sealed windows and puffing up the race car blankets pinned against them. A glance at her watch told her that despite it being well past sunrise, the room was still darker than it should be. The blizzard, which had begun late last night, had clearly not stopped yet.

"…I doubt they'll send out anyone until the blizzard has died down." She turned to look at him, and he had that not-quite-honest look in his eyes again. Like he was hiding something. Like things were worse than he was giving away. She shook her head.

"Well, if we're planning for another day at least… we need to figure out a few things. We want to minimize opening this door to keep the heat from the fire in, but unless we want to resort to a makeshift bathroom in here…" She glanced at him, and smirked at his raised eyebrows. "…then we should probably only go twice a day, and around the same time. I didn't check if there was any toilet paper though. We may have to conserve that as well. I don't know about you, but that's right up there on my list of things-I-can't-live-without, you know?"

Grissom watched her silently, one eyebrow lifted slightly, letting her overtalk her way to embarrassment. She gritted her teeth and looked away from him, trying to stop the incessant flow of words from her mouth.

After a few moments of silence, she picked up the large pot in which she'd collected snow the day before. It had apparently melted, sitting next to the fire the night before, but it had a thin layer of ice over the top now. She scooted it closer to the fire, wondering how she would manage to hold it close enough to the flame to boil the water without burning herself. Maybe they'd be able to find some bleach…

"…Merry Christmas, Sara." He said, softly, behind her, and she jumped. A glance over her shoulder told her that his eyes were still glued to her, and that he was not speaking facetiously. He really meant… Merry Christmas. A look around their desolate surroundings had made her want to doubt his sincerity, but it was there all the same.

Before she could say it back to him, he too had slid out of the bed. He stood there in the gray light of the room in full-length long-underwear, looking for the life of him like he was meant to be here. What had Craig said, when they first arrived here? Paul Bunyan Chic. Grissom made lumberjacks seem sexy. She giggled at that, and he raised another eyebrow, shaking his head.

"Let's take that bathroom break and hurry back. Without heat, our best bet is to stay wrapped up in the covers all day with the fire going. The less time out of bed, the better."

She nodded, trying not to think about what his words would mean in any other context, and together they slid the door open and back closed, to trap in heat, and Sara led the way down the hall, to the tiny bathroom. She glanced at him, but he gestured that she should precede him, so she stepped inside and closed the door. The light was dim through a window half-obscured by snow, and the toilet seat was freezing.

She would have hovered, germaphobe that she was, but it's hard to deal with feminine hygiene issues without actually sitting down. With more than a little apprehension, she tugged the string… and found the tampon almost completely clean. She had worn it last night because she hadn't been certain her period was over, and didn't want to deal with wet panties and gross vending machine tampons at a fancy Christmas party. But it was a relief that she would not have to deal with that, at least, while she was trapped in a blizzard with Grissom.

She thought she might, maybe, have one other tampon, in her purse, which she had left in the lab vehicle. Not needing it—or any others—was a huge relief.

There was a roll of toilet paper, for which she was also grateful, but she used as little as possible and hurried out, trying not to think about not being able to wash her hands, and about Grissom looking at her pee when he went in himself. God, this was mortifying. And she needed some Purell!

She paced the hallway, trying not to listen but definitely listening to the quiet rustle of his clothing as it was either pulled down or aside, and to the sound of him taking care of business. Had he listened to her pee? Oh, god, that was almost as bad as him seeing it!

If she'd believed in God, she would have prayed for the water to be turned back on, so they could flush. That seemed the kind of miracle that would be within his power, didn't it? It was such a small thing to ask.

He came out a moment later, and she blushed, and together they turned back to the bedroom. She closed the door, he tucked the towel back underneath it, and then—to her surprise—dug in his coat pocket, producing a small bottle of hand sanitizer. He snapped open the lid, put a dollop in his palm, and then offered it out to her.

She could have kissed him.

By the time she'd rubbed it in, Grissom had crawled back into the bed, on the opposite side of the fire, and was looking at her expectantly. She sighed, and rolled her eyes, stomping over to the bed and grudgingly sliding back into the awkward position. "Next thing you're going to tell me is we'll have to have sex to keep warm…"

She was teasing, but it kind of fell flat, and she was kicking herself for saying it when he raised one corner of his lips. "I wouldn't dream of it." She closed her eyes, ready to give up on speaking to him ever again. "…Some heavy petting should suffice."

Her eyes snapped open, and there was laughter in his eyes. And she couldn't help it. She started laughing too.


End file.
